GadgetGuy
Premium Pilot
- Joined
- Jun 18, 2015
- Messages
- 6,881
- Reaction score
- 2,199
A drone photography/videography business is no different than any other photography business. The ones who are most successful are not the most talented, but are those that are the best at business and marketing and sales. That usually involves outsourcing the photography because a person can only be in one place at a time, while a business owner can double and triple book jobs at the same time, while outsourcing the actual work, and focus exclusively on the marketing and sales. However, I doubt that a licensed pilot's time can be bought cheaply enough to make it profitable, when those operating without the 333 Exemption are your competition and can easily undercut you. Similarly, why wouldn't the licensed pilot get his own 333 Exemption and cut out the middleman, since the pilot's license is far more valuable than the jobs secured by the business owner without a pilot's license who currently has a 333 Exemption, but needs a licensed pilot with the necessary drone skills to do the actual drone photography. The 333 Exemption is and has been readily available for anyone that wants one with a reasonable business need. The only limiting factor is the time for processing and approving the application. There also is no doubt that the value of holding a pilot's license is a limited window, before less restrictive requirements are adopted, which will remove that requirement. It's not a sound business model going forward. However, let's compile a list of licensed pilots that have drone skills and see whether anyone with a 333 Exemption wants to pay what they are willing to work for, assuming they don't have the pilot's license themselves already, or even if they do, are overbooked and need to outsource.
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