The app FreePrints has been growing in popularity recently. This app appears to print photos for free, and then send them to your doorstep for a small delivery cost.
You may be left wondering – what is the catch behind this? Surely I am missing something… Fortunately, it is not a scam, there is no catch with FreePrints, and it is a great service to use.
Gone are the days of having to print photos off in store, now you can get them delivered to your door for free. We explain how this is achieved in this article.
What Does FreePrints Offer?
In an age where the smartphone is king, we are taking more and more photos than ever before. While swiping through your gallery is nice, there is something special about having a real copy of the photo.
But the cost of getting many photos printed can be offputting for many. But our problems can be solved by FreePrints.
FreePrints provides 85 free prints (size 4×6) per user, per month. This equates to over 1,000 over the course of the year! They are indeed free! You do have to pay a delivery charge – which typically starts at £1.49.
The app is incredibly easy to use too. You can select photos from various sources – such as your Facebook or Instagram account, your phone, or a computer. It is very simple to use, with a simple interface.
Potential Problems?
It is worth noting that the photos printed are size 4×6 – which for some isn’t big enough. A 4×6 print though is the standard photo size in the United Kingdom.
You also do have to pay for delivery – so it isn’t an entirely free service. But compared to the costs of regular printing, a delivery charge is still minimal.
You will also want to make sure that you have not added premium options to your basket – you should check at the checkout that you are only paying for what you want.
How can FreePrints make a profit out of this?
Many are cautious regarding ordering from FreePrints, as they wonder how a business can possibly run a model like this and make money.
It is actually a very simple business model – taking advantage of the “freemium” model, as well as other relevant cost-cutting areas.
Firstly, when printing in bulk – which FreePrints will obviously do hugely – costs can be lowered significantly. Photos can be churned out quickly, and packing them and distributing doesn’t require much manpower.
The fee for postage – £1.49 – may seem low, but this will cover a lot of costs. The actual costs for FreePrints to send customers their photos will be lower than £1.49 – due to the likelihood of a contract being signed with Royal Mail to be their distribution partner.
But where the app really makes its money, in line with the “freemium” model, is through upselling within the app.
This essentially means that when customers pay for prints outside of their free allowance, the profit being made on the extra sales makes up for any shortfall caused by the free printing.
For instance, if a customer decided they like a photo so much, that they wanted it in the bigger 7×5 or 9×6 size, they will pay 20p-30p extra. For the company, printing it in a slightly bigger size will cost the tiniest of fractions more than the regular amount.
Therefore, they are able to make a healthy profit in this area. For the “freemium” model to work, as long as a small portion of users use the premium features of the app, it can make it cost-effective to provide free prints to the majority.
Having the large customer base that FreePrints has means that there should always be plenty of customers that will use the premium features – which is useful for those purely wanting to use the free features.
This is a model used by many businesses, especially those providing mobile applications, which provide a basic model for everyone, but provide extra features for those happy to pay.
The Takeaway
FreePrints is proving to be a very popular app, with many people downloading the app, and getting their photos printing for a low fee.
FreePrints can be downloaded on both the Google Play Store for Android, and if you are more of an Apple aficionado, then the app can be found on the App Store. They also have a website, available at this link.
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Note: We are not affiliated to FreePrints in any way, nor have we been paid to provide this article. This article is for information purposes only, and the information within the article is accurate as of October 2020.
