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Welcome to Make Your Passion Pay, hosted by LuAnn Buechler, a seasoned leader with a master’s degree in Hospitality Administration and a recipient of the TLC Award for Leadership. This podcast is designed for business owners who have left toxic environments to create their own thriving workplaces but find themselves struggling with team building and mindset. Join LuAnn as she shares insights and strategies to help you cultivate joy and a positive mindset in your business and personal life. Drawing from her experience working with renowned leaders like Dr. Ivan Misner, LuAnn guides you in building a supportive community and mastering the art of people management. Each episode offers practical advice and inspiring stories to empower you to transform your work environment into one that reflects your values and passions. Tune in to discover how to lead with joy, foster meaningful connections, and truly make your passion pay.
Welcome everyone to Make Your Passion Pay podcast, where we talk about the six seasons in the playbook of making your passion pay. Those would be clarity, connection, community, collaboration—we're going to focus on those two today—creativity, and commitment. So many others have come up in our conversations, which is fabulous. Today, I'm excited to be with Lesle Lane. Lesle is the founder and lead photographer of Studio 13, a commercial and corporate photography studio serving regional to national clients. A third-generation photographer with more than three decades of experience, she's transformed her family's legacy business—I love that—into a modern brand focused on helping companies strengthen their visual identity through high-quality imagery. Under her leadership, Studio 13 specializes in corporate, industrial, architectural, and branding photography for organizations across a wide range of industries. No more of that. Without further ado, Lesle, welcome.
(00:04:55.296) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Thank you so much. It's a pleasure to be here today.
(00:04:58.696) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: I'm so glad to have you. We struggled a little bit to connect because life happens, but here we are finally getting to chat.
(00:05:06.796) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Yes, life does happen. Let's all remember
(00:05:08.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: That. So Lesle, tell my listeners a little bit about Studio 13, your family business, that you have now, the third generation taking over.
(00:05:24.596) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Yes, a lot changed in three generations with my mom and I figured out last week that we have had somebody taking pictures in our family for 95 years. I think that is just something to be celebrated this year. So, my grandfather started out the first generation. He actually worked for the original Olan Mills down in Florida, even though Olan Mills was out of Ohio. He started down in Florida and then he and my grandmother had a thriving portrait wedding business down in Columbus, Georgia that my aunts took over once they were done. Then my mother and my biological father actually did color laboratory work when it transitioned from black and white film to color film. Then my biological parents got divorced, my mother met my stepfather and moved to Indianapolis, Indiana, where he was a well-known corporate photographer, and I took that business over when I was in my early 20s. I am now running an incarnation of his business here today.
(00:06:27.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Well, I guess that's a real example of something, the blood running through your family and photography. What? That's crazy. Good. I remember Olan Mills when I was a little girl. Our parents would get us our pictures taken by Olan Mills. That's so interesting.
(00:06:44.296) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: It was the thing.
(00:06:46.796) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Yeah, super exciting. And now you have a team.
(00:06:51.396) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: I do, I have a team of 15 freelancers. So everybody is a contractor, 1099 employee, and they cover a wide variety of things. Some of which I do, some of which I don't do. So video, drone, still photography, and then events and corporate work as well. And then I also have a salesperson, an administrator, and a social media person. So I don't have to do everything in my business.
(00:07:16.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Wow. It sounds like you really have built a community of professional photographers. Would that be a fair statement?
(00:07:24.096) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: That would be a very fair statement. If you know many photographers out there, you know that they get into the business to take pictures. That's really why they do it. And a lot of the other business aspects of it are not their strength. So doing the editing and getting it delivered on time, invoicing and selling and networking and quoting, all of those things kind of fall by the wayside because they really got into the business to take pictures. And so, what I do is I come alongside these photographers and I find the work, I manage the account, and they get to just take pictures.
(00:07:56.996) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: So, do you still take pictures?
(00:07:58.296) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: I do still take pictures. I'm still a producer in my company. I'm just able to delegate some things that maybe I don't do or I don't like to do, and then focus on the things that really require my 30 years of experience.
(00:08:12.996) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: And really probably pick and choose what projects you are actually the photographer on.
(00:08:20.696) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Yes. A lot of things that I love to do, I haven't quite been able to train other people to do yet, and so, like, architectural photography is quite difficult to see the angles and it's always a mixed lighting situation. So how are we going to balance that lighting? So those I haven't been able to train anyone to do yet, and then industrial and manufacturing is another side of it. Both of these types of work I absolutely love because they are so complex. So those are the two that I really am solely the only person in my business that really can do those types of work.
(00:08:54.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: I don't even know what industrial means.
(00:08:57.096) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Oh, it's wonderful. It's dirty. It's awesome. So it's where you go into a place that they either make something. One time, I worked for Big Ass Fans. If you've ever seen the fans, the big fans, and they were ionizing. So they were taking the metal, and they were acid etching it, and then turning it into another material. So they were coating it. And so, I had to go in and show the process of how they take these metal fan blades, acid, chemical reaction, and then they change the color on it with front coating. And then I had to show how they did that without actually showing anything that was proprietary. So a lot of the industrial work is so confidential that you have to figure out a way to show the process without actually showing the process.
(00:09:47.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: behind the process,
(00:09:49.296) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Right?
(00:09:52.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: So it's not videography. When I think of a process or a movement like that, I think of video, but I suppose that includes too much proprietary information and that's
(00:10:04.196) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Part of both. We offer both, and so because a lot of times videos are a little more lengthy, sometimes they have audio and they have text where they're telling a story, where the still photography is an immediate impact. And socially, when you're talking about grabbing somebody's attention on a home page, a lot of times they'll have that still image that really has that boom. So we do both of them. I don't do video, but my people do video for me, and so I'm in charge of those immediate impact images.
(00:10:39.996) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: And so just how did you build a collaboration like this? Was it just surely the knowledge that a lot of photographers don't like to do the business side of being a photographer?
(00:10:55.696) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Well, it was twofold. First of all, my mother had this concept back in the 90s. She really was the one that had the immediate community of photographers; that was her idea, but it wasn't the right time. The business of photography was so different back in the 90s than it is today, where now gig work is very popular. Some of it was just sheer luck that it was available during my time frame and not my mother's time frame. The other thing was, you know, necessity is the mother of invention, and at a time where I was turning work away, I was referring it off to other people because I had more than what I could do. At that same time, my 30-year business partner, administrator, my all-around gal—she'd been with me my whole entire career—she passed away unexpectedly. So we had pretty much decided the two of us were going to ride off into the sunset, and I was left with a business that I had not run by myself ever. So my daughter came into the business and she said, I'll give you two years of my life to help you figure out how to do business differently, how to scale this business, and how to grow it into something that is not only more beneficial for you, but a sellable asset by the time you retire.
(00:12:23.196) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: And is your daughter still with you?
(00:12:24.496) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Nope, she gave me two years and she backed out immediately.
(00:12:30.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: What does she do for a living?
(00:12:31.596) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Now, she raises my two beautiful grandchildren, with one more on the way. We can't wait.
(00:12:37.096) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Bless her. That's so awesome. I have two grandbabies too. So special.
(00:12:41.196) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Yep, very much so. They make my day.
(00:12:45.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: So, your mother knew to build community.
(00:12:51.096) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Correct.
(00:12:51.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: And you had the right hand that started to help you. So, did you basically learn what your right hand was handling so that you could hire others and support them?
(00:13:04.996) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: No. Actually, it was a need to diversify. So my right hand didn't do the photography. She did the editing, she did some of the quoting, she did more behind the scenes. The thing about being a commercial photographer is your neck is kind of on the chopping block because you're the one that takes all the pressure of the shoot. You're the one that has to perform under the spotlight, and not everybody has a personality that can handle that. She was one of those people that was perfectly happy cheering for me behind the scenes, and so I needed other people that could really perform under pressure. Luckily, I had a handful of assistants that worked for me, photographic assistants, that had businesses of their own. Also, I taught photography during the Great Recession of 08, 09, 10—for some of us, that lasted forever. Since I had to go into teaching for a short period of time, I have a pool of previous students that have gone into the industry. That's how I started building my community of photographers and started to come up with the idea that I could make money by keeping that business in-house and not having to work quite as hard when I had more business than I could deal with myself.
(00:14:24.396) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Fascinating. So, it's not a franchise, it's
(00:14:29.596) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: a
(00:14:29.896) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: collaboration.
(00:14:30.496) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Definitely,
(00:14:32.196) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: and they all technically have their own businesses, correct?
(00:14:36.996) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Correct.
(00:14:38.096) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: But you also source business for them.
(00:14:42.996) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: I do, and some of them actually have real jobs. What I like to say are real jobs, where they're just looking for side work. So I've got one gal that's a concert organist, and she assists me on the side. I've got one gal that's a speech therapist, and she assists me on the side. Then I have other people that are actual photographers, but they just don't have enough work on their own or they're looking to supplement it again. The business side of photography gets—it's a heavy load to bear when you have to do everything yourself, and so they appreciate not having to look for every single job that they have.
(00:15:21.896) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: So what's the financial arrangement in a business like that?
(00:15:26.596) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Well, I consider myself somewhat of a broker and so the business comes through me. I find the business, I quote the business, and then I decide which photographer gets the job. Then I take a cut of the job and they take a cut of the job.
(00:15:43.996) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Super. Do you know anyone else using this model?
(00:15:47.996) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: I really don't. I haven't gone out searching for it. I know that there are large brokers that do it for wedding and real estate photography. So if you ever use a company like, I think it's called George Street, they do weddings. They broker those out to different wedding photographers around the country. The problem with that is that they pay them so poorly that the photographers are normally pretty angry. I only know that because I have photographers on my team that used to do it, and they go out and they shoot weddings for such a low amount of money that they really don't enjoy the work. Because I don't know if you've ever had this experience, but there's nothing worse than working really hard and being poor.
(00:16:33.796) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: And right. I think you made that comment when we talked, right? It's hard to make money, but it's harder to be poor or something.
(00:16:43.496) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Well, and I did it for a long time because during that great recession, I took some of that real estate work that came through a brokerage firm, and I can tell you the hourly amount that they paid their photographers is so low. But it's better than zero dollars. So you go out and you work really, really hard and you don't make the money that your skill and expertise really should be making. And so that's why I stopped. When I started this brokerage part of my business, I wanted to make sure that the people made a fair wage so that they could support themselves, but also that we provided a quality of work that could warrant that kind of investment. So that's kind of when you look at our work, what we provided is elevated, and by doing the business part of it myself and handling the editing myself, I make sure that the job is done to my standards and delivered in the timeline that the client requests.
(00:17:48.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: So, I'm hearing creativity in here, right? So with creativity, you imagine a different approach to photography that would ultimately still provide the quality that you expect and support other photographers. I mean it's just a triple win situation in my viewpoint of what you've created here and it's doing what you love, right? My friends, my audience, doing what you love, and she's allowing people to do what they love in their photography work without having to run a business, supporting their dreams and her own. I mean that's just fabulous, right? I always like to remind people that there is always a way to make money doing what you love, we just need to be creative about it.
(00:18:42.296) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: We do and the team is wonderful. I mean, I can tell you right now that not only are they great photographers but they're great people. What they have brought to me is the ability—so many of you know that the Final Four has been in Indianapolis and we have had so many requests come in for event photography that I would have just had to turn away. Because first of all, I don't shoot event photography. I hate it. I'm not good at
(00:19:11.096) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: it.
(00:19:11.296) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: I find people abhorrent in large crowds. I just don't like it. But I have a team of people that I could send out over the last three days to handle international accounts while they're here in Indianapolis. We did the same thing when the NBA All-Star Game was here. Things that 10 years ago, I would not have been able to have come into my business at all, my team now handles that for me at a level that I could never offer my clients before.
(00:19:40.796) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Oh, fantastic. I forgot that you were in Indianapolis. What a great opportunity. Yes. And did you hear the wonderland? Want to pick this up, right? And emphasize what you're doing? Lesle, you're playing to other people's strengths, you're allowing them to flourish in the areas of their strengths and areas that are not your strengths.
(00:20:08.096) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: And you can't do everything well, my father used to say. If you think you're good at everything, that means you're good at nothing. That's right. My father used to tell me, and so I know what I'm not good at. I've got one photographer that refuses to shoot headshots; he hates headshots, so I don't book him for headshots, and they all get that opportunity to say yes for this, no for that. Sometimes I'll even talk to them about a specific job. Hey, I have this job in mind for you. Do you want me to pursue it? And they give me a thumbs up or thumbs down. That is so much flexibility for their life.
(00:20:42.396) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: I'm so empowering. And again, I want people to hear this. You might not be in the photography business, you might be in something else, but allowing people to work in the area of their strengths, to flourish doing what they love, that supports the greater good of the whole company, right? Studio 13 is winning because every photographer on your team is winning and getting to do what they love.
(00:21:14.296) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: That is the goal every day.
(00:21:16.396) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: So powerful, right? And when you started this, did you really see that, or was it just a means to an end at the beginning?
(00:21:26.796) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: You know, having done this, I almost feel like I've reinvented myself so many times in my career because of so many things that have happened. I think that when my daughter came in and said, I'm going to help you figure this out, I was like, whatever. It was just like one more thing, and it really hasn't been until the last couple of years. So, I've been doing this this way now for five years, and it just now has taken off to the place where I'm like, oh my gosh, this is gonna work. I want to tell your listeners, when you make a change to your organization—and I would even say this if you are a solopreneur, let's just say that, that's what you're doing—everything takes about 12 to 18 months to really take off. I know everybody wants to get rich quick, and I know everybody wants it to just take off because it's the best thing ever. But with every new marketing tactic that I have employed and every new business change that I've implemented, it is taking about 12 to 18 months for it to really take off. And I am in the last, like I said, last two years, really seeing this concept of people, companies want to come to one source to take care of their marketing, photography, videography needs because corporate America is stronger than ever. People are getting asked to work more for the same pay and do more with less resources. And so for them to be able to contact me and say, can you please take care of this, and then walk away and know that they don't have to think about it again, I feel like that's really been what has caused this to take off. People really need resources right now, and they don't have time to be looking into three or four different people to do the same type of work.
(00:23:31.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Right. So you're providing them with an insistent, trustworthy resource to handle the projects from start to finish and all projects related to that. One of the conversations I'm having in my networks is we are in a trust recession because people don't know who to trust anymore, and now they've come to trust Lesle Lane, right? And you're lending that trust to the photographers you bring on your team.
(00:24:06.796) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Right? And that's why we have processes in place. So not only am I training them, but they have standard operating procedures for their projects, their jobs. This is what you wear. This is how you behave. This is what the photography is. Here's how you handle your social media accounts. Everything is laid out as if they were my full-time employee so that when they go out and represent Studio 13, that client knows that that immediately gets them a level of trust because you cannot rebuild a reputation if you lose it. And so every organization out there, however you run your business, it's easier to keep your reputation than to rebuild it.
(00:24:48.396) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: You know, this is interesting. I work with a lot of people in the trades because tradespeople go out and hang up their shingle and then realize they need to build a team and they don't know the first thing about building a team. And to that end, a lot of the trades in construction and so forth are outsourcing to subcontractors, which is basically what you're doing, but you're holding them accountable to a standard operating procedure. And I hear my contractors saying, how can I do that? But you absolutely can do that. If you are sourcing business for them, which is what you're doing, right? Then you can hold them to the standard as Lesle is with her photographers,
(00:25:33.596) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: You can, and I also let my photographers and videographers know that I might show up on their job. So it is not unusual that if they are with a client that is a new client and I don't have a relationship with this person, maybe I've never met them. I do get a lot of what I call cold searches from the internet. I will show up if their job is local and I can get there. I will show up to make that relationship with the client and to check and make sure that everything is going as I expected it. So with your tradespeople that you're talking about, the owner of the company needs to be prepared to put in, or maybe someone in business development, to put in the time to make sure that that relationship shows that they can be held accountable. You know, show up to that job site and make sure that your subcontractor has showed up looking the way they're supposed to, acting the way they're supposed to, and performing their job the way they're supposed to.
(00:26:32.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Right. Keeping the job site the quality, yeah, the way they're supposed to. And I think about my clients, yes. So there's the key in that statement: relationships, right? And so you are the relationship creator on the client level that these other business owners need to be. And as I work with them, I see that many of them want to be that relationship person. They're often too stuck in the tactical day-to-day to actually take the time to be that relationship person, and so it's building the structure, the standard operating procedures, the core values, the expectations, right, that everybody agrees to live by so you can count on them presenting the quality that you expect.
(00:27:23.996) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Yes, so many times if it's a new client, I might bring the shooter that I want to give this account to. I might bring them and we shoot the first job together. So, for your tradespeople, is there a way that you and your subcontractor can perform one project together to make sure that they understand and to build the relationship with their customer, build the relationship with your tradesperson to make sure that everybody is on the same page? One other thing that I do that I think is extremely important when I'm subcontracting out: I compliment and let my workers know when they do a great job. And when the client sends me an email that says, you know, this photographer did an amazing job, thank you so much, that is immediately forwarded to my subcontractor to let them know they have performed well. I think criticism is less important than praise.
(00:28:23.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Oh, yes, recognition, recognition. And when they do it right in alignment with your core values, with your standard operating procedures, recognize, recognize, recognize. It creates that culture. We all want to be seen and heard, and you're just saying you saw that I am a quality professional as well.
(00:28:51.396) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Correct. And you know, I'm sure you're running into this in the trades. Finding talent is hard.
(00:28:55.996) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Yeah,
(00:28:56.496) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Yeah. It's the biggest competition we have. Trust and talent are the two biggest competitions we have right now. So if your tradespeople have the opportunity to work with you or your competitor, and you show them that they're a real person and that you appreciate their work, and the other person doesn't, who do you think they're going to take the jobs from?
(00:29:17.096) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. As I've just met a gentleman, starting a business where he plans to build that talent pool. So he can provide skilled labor to the contractors.
(00:29:36.896) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: That's fabulous.
(00:29:37.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Brilliant isn't it
(00:29:38.896) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: absolutely.
(00:29:41.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: And so again, my friends who are listening, whatever your idea, whatever your expertise, there is an opportunity to make money doing what you love. And if you can't come up with it on your own, by all means, I'd love to talk with you. Lesle, how can people reach out to you to learn more about the photography business?
(00:30:04.696) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Well, if you want to see my work, see what our team is doing. Studio 13 Online, calm is our website. There is a contact us page that goes directly into my inbox so you can reach me there. I'm also on LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook.
(00:30:20.296) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: And are you hiring on more photographers?
(00:30:22.896) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: I always love to keep my opportunities open, usually around the country because we do have jobs that show up in different places. But most importantly, I will, in the next 10 years, bring on a successor. So if somebody likes to work hard and wants a business model that works, I am always open to speaking to people about that.
(00:30:47.196) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Sounds like potentially you could put this into a franchise.
(00:30:51.296) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Model. You know, I have been told that. You're not the first person to tell me that.
(00:30:56.396) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Hey, the word franchise keeps coming up in my world over and over again. And I have this thought process, right? Well, we talked about core values in the sixes to make in your passion space, and that core values with a franchise organization started at the top and need to be implemented all the way down into every franchise. So I feel like there's an opportunity there for coaches like myself that work with core values to help people make sure that happens. Right.
(00:31:31.596) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Absolutely,
(00:31:32.796) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: So that said, I've been getting to know some franchise folks. If you want a connection to those individuals, you let me know. Lesle, we'll make sure that Lesle's contact information and social media links are all in the show notes for today. Lesle, any more advice that you would give to my audience?
(00:31:52.996) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: but just one,
(00:31:54.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Okay, good.
(00:31:55.096) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Make sure you have a mentor. I spent so much of my young career working in a vacuum where I only had the same few people around me all the time, and they were all in the industry. I'm not saying you don't need somebody in your industry to be a mentor, but having a network of people that know more than you do and that you can speak to not just about your ideas for growth for your business, but running into economic and financial hard times within the country or just within your industry, it's always great to have a group of people that you can contact when you have questions. So everybody needs a mentor of some kind.
(00:32:41.796) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: Yes, and I would even expand upon that. I've had others talk about having a board of advisors, so you have different people in different professions that are your respected confidants that you can go to because, my friends, no one does this alone. So when you're feeling alone, please reach out to others. If you're in the photography arena, absolutely reach out to my friend Lesle here. Any others, reach out to me, and I'm happy to connect you in my big, bold network of people that know. Lesle, it's been a pleasure.
(00:33:22.396) Lesle Lane, Studio 13: Thank you so much. I have enjoyed every moment of it.
(00:33:24.596) LuAnn Buechler, Make Your Passion Pay: You have a great rest of your day as well. My audience, enjoy, and we'll see you again next time.