$430 per wedding is already minus all expense incurred during the job. It is the nett profit.
Of cos, I would like to charge $3.2K and do 1 wedding a month. But people must be willingly to pay me this amount for what I can produce. Frankly, now I can only command $650-800 per wedding.
As I said, even $3.2 take home pay might not be enough to feed a family. But as a part-time, not too bad.
The list of expenses in the from the $650 to give $430.50 is nowhere near the kind of accurate accounts one would keep in order to run a viable business or to do wedding photography in the long term and certainly does not reflect nett profit. some major costs not factored in include
1.depreciation of computer equipment
2. depreciation of software (of course if one is using pirated software then i have nothing to say)
3. Insurance. Both for yourself and third party liability.
4. Cost of website. both setting up and operating cost (of course you can use flickr but not very pro looking)
5. sample albums
6. equipment repair (not same as depreciation and at 8 weddings a month you're going to need lots of it)
7. cell phone, water, power (unless the business does not need it)
8. professional development (unless one doesn't plan on getting better)
9. Marketing costs (funny thing i actually think part timers need to spend a lot on this because there are so many other part timers around and to be able to shoot 8 weddings a month, I actually think marketing costs will be quite high)
the fact is the list keeps going on and on and on.
And many part time photographers say nah, i don't have these expenses or i'm already having or using it, why account for it? Well, the reason is because if you don't you might be paying to shoot a couple's wedding, which in that case, why not just sit at home and not make a loss instead?
Also many people will ask, what's the big deal about not accounting properly, and as my financial adviser tells me, the importance is simple. Over account for your costs and you'll retire with more money than you anticipated. That can only be a good thing.
Under account for your expenses in a high cash flow low profit business (as is the case for wedding photography) and the time you will find out your mistake is when you retire or when something catastrophic happens to you. The worst time to find out because that's when you need cash the most.
So i'd rather over account than under account for costs.