CASE STUDY 7 Photo Research Expertise Reduces Permissions Fees by 40%
Recently PreMediaGlobal’s photo research team was approached by a large educational
publisher to analyze and reshape a national K-6 mathematics program that had been
published several years ago. The goal was to adapt the national program for a
state-specific use, while cutting the photo permissions costs and reducing the
permissions liabilities that existed from poor management and execution by previous
vendors. The program consisted of nearly 3,000 images across all grade levels.
To accomplish this, the team needed to read and understand the text, including
mathematical problems and examples, and review the current image selected for
the text, considering its source, cost, and permissions implications. This required
not only permissions expertise but also familiarity with the hundreds of sources
utilized by the project and their reputation in terms of litigation. Fortunately, the team
was able to call upon their many decades of combined permissions experience
to understand all the issues involved. More appropriate replacement images were
found, using approved sources and the client’s database of owned images.
The schedule was extremely tight: 2½ months to replace and clear all items.
Not only did we make the deadline, we also performed the additional service of
reviewing pages to be sure the composition team placed the image substitutions
properly. The client realized approximately 40% savings on permissions fees and
significantly eliminated permissions liabilities.
