The image of care

I find radio a pleasant way of winding down after a hard weekend of football, cricket and eating. And while getting the Sunday evening meal together I like to listen to Pienaar’s Politics not so much for the topics – let’s face it we get plenty of politics on all forms of media, rather because of an interesting experiment the BBC are running on this show.

Each week a studio guest representing ‘the man/woman in the street’ joins the political pundits in the studio and invariably talks a lot more sense than the so-called experts and their Pavlovian responses to questions which they have learned on expensive media training courses. Anyone can be guest, all a person has to do is send in a short resume and the production team chooses who will sit in the hot seat.

How different this is from the ubiquitous Question Time (TV and radio versions) where politicians who pull wool are joined by a B-list celebrity whose knowledge of the issues of the day is less than zero if the topic is outside the pages of OK magazine.

I’d much rather hear the opinions of the lorry driver who sits next to me at football than a so-called expert who a few days, hours, minutes after leaving the studio are proved wrong. And this has been particularly resonant in the aftermath of the tragedy in Japan where experts have traded academic blows over what will happen next while the poor people caught up in the middle of the horror seems to know a lot more.

And this week a pioneering NHS scheme in Norwich was rolled out with rave reviews from participants. Could it be that a combination of common sense and decency resonates more than a string of qualifications?

It’s always good to have something to celebrate and it is with a great deal of pride we wish one of the Care images team, Tim Brown, a very Happy 50th Birthday!

Tim is one of the most remarkable people I have had the pleasure of working with. A talented and experienced IT programmer, Tim was part of the team that built the original Daily Telegraph website in the 1990s and he programmed and has managed the Care Images site from the start, as well as having an input in direction and photography.

Tim is a person committed to social justice and human rights and he has put an enormous amount of work into Care Images to ensure that we continually strive to present a positive image of care. We constantly get positive feedback from clients and visitors to Care Images – the site’s ease of use and functionality is all down to Tim’s hard work. So on your 50th birthday Tim, put your feet up, raise a glass have a great day!

careimages.com has been up and running for around four years and in that time we have followed a simple and successful formula of providing high quality images of care to a raft of local authorities, charities and NFP organisations along with design studios working with them. Feedback from our customers has invariably been positive, particularly the way we strive to meet requests for new shoots images as quickly as possible.

For a niche library our pricing structure is very competitive in our subscription and pay-per-image options – we understand the constraints that the sector is working with. We have kept our prices at the same level for four years but from 4th April we are introducing a new pricing structure – like all businesses, our costs have risen.

For subscribers, we are adding a further two images to the annual subscription making a total of 12 images for a fee of £295 which still works out at under £25 for a royalty free image. Additional pictures for a subscription will now cost £11. Individual picture purchases for non-subscribers will be priced at £49.

As price increases go, we believe ours is as soft a landing as is possible and we thank all our clients for their custom over the years and look forward to welcoming current clients back and new ones to benefit from the UK’s leading library of images of care.