High-speed photo profits

At 30 Minute Photos in Irvine, Calif., customers can relax and leisurely click through their digital photos on the store's five Lucidiom photo kiosks. (Read more about 30 Minute's "boutique approach" to photo retailing.)

But it is a behind-the-counter device, coupled with a clever pricing scheme, that is bringing the store some high-dollar sales.

In June 2006, the store went through a complete overhaul aimed at getting customers to linger longer. One of the machines acquired in that makeover was a high-speed photo scanner. Owner Mitch Goldstone said the machine can scan thousands of photos in a matter of minutes; customers bring in their photo collections "by the shoeboxful" and wait while they are digitized.

Once scanned, the photos are transferred to a kiosk. The customer is then informed that he can print up to 10 5x7 enlargements from the scanned photos at no charge.

"I can't recall a single customer that just made the 10 free enlargements," Goldstone said. "Just imagine all of your family photos, suddenly viewable on a kiosk. You go through making one or two free ones, then you just go wild."