It appears I’ve gotten too good for Wal-mart.
I took some photographs of my nieces and nephews last week, and did some post-processing, and thought it would be a nice gesture if I went and had some prints made up for Christmas gifts. I took an SD-card and loaded the postprocessed images on it, and went to Wally World after work the other morning, and ordered a nice assortment of prints.
Walmart refused to sell the finished prints to me, citing “Copyright Violation”. WTF?
Wal-Mart drone: We can’t sell you these because they appear to be professional pictures.
Me: Thanks, but I took these myself.
WMD: Can I see the original negatives?
Me: They’re digital! There are no negatives!
WMD: Unless I can see the originals, or you have a photographer’s release, I can’t sell these to you.
Me: OK, I’ll sign a photographer’s release. Can I have the pictures?
WMD: If you can show me the original negatives.
Me: There are no negatives!
WMD: Then I have to see the original files.
Me: Can you read Nikon Raw files?
WMD: No, I need to see the original JPEG files, in the camera.
Well, screw that. I refuse to fight that kind of ignorance. And I’m not hauling in a thousand bucks worth of camera equipment into a Wal-mart.
Me: OK, keep the pictures. You make it too hard to do business with you, you won’t be needing mine.
So you, dear reader, get to see my pix.
Walmart just doesn’t get to see any more of my business.
This is a common problem with Walmart. cases like this have often been discussed in the photo forums at dpreview.com
Walmart emplyoyees up to the managers are sometimes just so stupid
I hate to say it, but that’s why they work at
WAL-MART!!! Notice the emphesis, on WAL-MART! Not photography store. They are just doing as their told. Dad we all know how good you are at this. Mike, the kids and I need to come let you photograph us too! :)
I guess that is one heck of a comment you got there. They’ve probably been sued for printing professional photos with out concent and are overdoing the CMA stance.
When are you photographing my group? We have not had a family portrait since…humm…how do I say this: The awful family portrait we had taken at….WAL-MART 6 or so years ago.