Jerry Tomko and his Iron Guts

“You never know what you have until it’s gone!” That old familiar adage too often rings true. When life is going along smoothly, many people have a tendency to take good health for granted… along with every other wonderful gift that is being enjoyed at the time. However, when good health is threatened, it doesn’t take long to realize that nothing else in the world is as important or matters so much.

Such was the case for Jerry Tomko, owner of Gerard Tomko Photography in the suburbs of Philadelphia, PA. He was going about his life and working hard, when unexpectedly his whole existence changed. For most of his adult life, with the exception of minor flu bugs and the normal aches and pains of long hours and growing older, Jerry had enjoyed robust health and vitality, and was a whirlwind of energy. However, in August 2007, he was diagnosed with life-threatening stomach cancer.

After a little over a year, Jerry is beating the odds of cancer and is back on the job full time, with a deeper appreciation for his health and life. His last series of tests were further proof that he’s on his way to a complete recovery. According to Jerry, doctors have said that everything looks perfect; there are no signs of the cancer at all.

Jerry’s health ordeal actually began in 2006, when he had surgery to remove kidney stones. That December, he had an operation to remove his parathyroid gland to curb the production of the re-occurring kidney stones.

“By the spring of 2007, I was still feeling sluggish, drained and couldn’t seem to bounce back from that last surgery. It wasn’t like me to feel so exhausted, but I passed it off as just having a hard time adjusting to the surgery in December. I was eating well and even put on a few pounds, so I figured it was because I was not exercising and burning off the calories. In May, I was found to be anemic, and had to be given two units of blood. I had three weddings that weekend and I had commitments to my brides and I didn’t want to let them down. I underwent further tests at the end of July and I got the bad news. On August 15, I was at the Thomas Jefferson University Hospital back on the operating table again where they removed 80 percent of my stomach. They got all the cancer, but I still had to undergo three and a half months of chemotherapy and 25 radiation treatments. It was very frustrating, scary and was the last thing I expected to happen to me. My family and my brides kept me going. I couldn’t stop thinking how important their wedding day is to them and their families. Letting them down and not showing up was unacceptable. Throughout my recuperation period, I only personally missed five weddings, which my daughter Amy and my two other photographers on staff who make up ‘Team Tomko’ filled in for me. Without brides knowing, I even photographed a few weddings while wearing a chemo pump. I never told them until after they picked up their proofs,” Tomko says with a wry smile.

Aside from changing his perspective on life, Jerry’s health issues also showed him he needed to change the way he was doing business to become more efficient and profitable. He says Revolution Imaging & Design (www.revolutionimagingdesign.com) has helped him catch up on production, which naturally fell behind while he was sick. Jerry always did all the digital work, postproduction and ordering jobs himself with no in-studio employees. He admits that was one of the best decisions he had made.

“One of the positive changes I made after my illness is in the way I handle all postproduction and album design. I have gone back to my old film workflow,” Tomko says. “Now photos are not released to the Internet until clients come into the studio and pick up their paper proofs. After all, images are released online for friends and family to view, not necessarily to buy! By making couples wait, it gives them more incentive to come back sooner. Then an appointment is scheduled to do an in-studio album design. It takes more time, but I have better control of the sale, albums are going into production sooner, and my sales have dramatically increased. Many photographers tell brides to pick ‘pictures,’ and they do that, when they get around to it. Some photographers charge a flat fee for their time and give brides loose proofs or post them on the Internet, but don’t follow up with an album—that is too much work. I don’t want to be perceived that way. I want my clients to have a beautiful album as a remembrance of their day.”
Jerry also remarked that he receives four to six calls a month from brides who had someone else take their wedding photographs, but never offered them an album. “That is just sad,” Jerry remarks, but he politely turns down these requests.

Since his illness Jerry has learned to enjoy life and stop putting off the things he’d like to do because life is fragile and one never knows what the future holds. For years, he wanted to give seminars and teach, but never had the time to actually do it. Now, he has created a program, titled “How To Survive Digital Wedding Photography With No Guts,” which is a play on words referring to his cancer ordeal. He has already given this program at the West Virginia and Connecticut state PPA conventions and hopes to expand his lecture tour to include WPPI and other schools and professional organizations around the nation.

“In my program, I tell photographers what happened to me and how I am bouncing back from it. I explain how photographers should be proactive instead of reactionary. I discuss how to increase sales and raise the perception of professional photographers. I’ll also cover album design and having clients return to the studio for the proof viewing and pre-album design. This keeps them current and thinking about getting it done early. Photographers don’t realize that letting brides pick whatever they want, whenever they want to do it, costs photographers money. I saw a statistic on the Internet recently that stated that 75 percent of the brides who are married seven months or longer, still have not come back into the studio to order their albums. If photographers just hand over the proofs and expect the clients to be timely, forget about it. So, I’ve found a way to get brides back in to order sooner without giving them a discount,” Jerry says, “and it really works!”

Aside from word-of-mouth and referrals from previous happy brides, Jerry’s best source of new clients is his blog. His blog is all about his brides and their weddings, not who he hangs with. “Brides do not care about my social life. All they care about is seeing themselves and letting everyone else see them too!” he comments. Jerry specializes in weddings and shoots between 45–50 per year, some of which are destination weddings. He has traveled to Cancun, Quebec and all over the United States to shoot nuptials. Jerry does no paid advertising and his business is still booming, so he must be doing something right.

Jerry is a veteran photographer having been in the industry for 28 years photographing weddings and portraits. He holds a Master of Photography and his Craftsman degrees from PPA and has been a member of WPPI for most of the years he’s been in business. The WPPI convention is the highlight of his business year, where he picks up new ideas, and trends and renews old friendships.     

Art has been of interest to Jerry since childhood, when he did a lot of drawing and illustrations. Photography was also important to him as a hobby but he didn’t seriously consider it as a career until he was an adult. Through the years, while he was working in the defense industry, he shot weddings on the side. In the 1980s when the military bases were closing, he lost his job, so he decided to tackle photography full time, and has never regretted this decision. At one time, in the early years, Jerry had a storefront location, but he later moved his business to his home where he shoots mostly on location. He has one tastefully-decorated room devoted to his business, where clients meet for consultations and presentations.
Jerry uses Canon EOS-1Ds Mark II cameras and a variety of focal length lenses. He prefers natural and available light when possible and carries only the Canon 580 EX flash unit to events. He would like to thank Queensbury and Kambara USA albums for helping him during his ordeal—it was always helpful to know that they were there for him and “had his back!” Also, he is grateful to Revolution Imaging & Design, which is his “staff behind the scenes” for the production work.

As for his future, he plans to continue getting healthier and stronger and living each day to the fullest. Beating the odds is what he does best! Teaching and lecturing are important goals for the future as well. “I’m not all about money and fame. I care so much about this industry that I’d love to share my knowledge and experience with other photographers, and help the new people coming up. I don’t intend to be chasing brides around in the next 10 to 15 years, so I’d like to get established as a teacher,” Jerry says.

Throughout his whole difficult health trauma, Jerry kept his sense of humor and positive attitude. He believes this approach helped him heal faster than if he had felt sorry for himself and worried about his physical condition. “Once you have cancer, you gain a totally different outlook on life and appreciate every day of good health and being active again. Life is a blessing,” Jerry concludes, smiling.

Readers may contact Jerry Tomko via email at: [email protected] and view his website/blog at www.gerardtomko.com.

Linda L. May is a freelance writer/photographer based in Iowa.