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Research Outline

Prepared for Eric M. | Delivered August 28, 2020

Passport and Visa Market

Goals

Evaluate a new market by providing information on 1) how many passports & visas are issued each year globally and its forecasted size in 2025; 2) how many passport & visa photos are printed at Walgreens, UPS, Fedex, and CVS in the US each year, 3) the total serviceable market in the US of passport and visa photos printed in-store at retailers and its forecasted size in 2025, and 4) the global market size of countries that allow passport & visa photos printed at home or with a digital camera.

Early Findings

2020 & 2025 Global Passports & Visas Market Size

  • Global E-Passports- Global “E-passport and E-visa Market" is expected to grow at a CAGR of roughly 8.2% over the next five years, will reach $126 billion in 2024, from $78.80 billion in 2020.
  • E-market sizing was used, as these documents now must be scannable.
  • There are no other market sizings for passports and visas, other than e-passports and visas.

The U.S. Department of State requires two copies of the same photo for every passport application. They ask for photos to be 2 x 2 inches large, in color, against a plain white or off-white background, and on glossy or matte photo-quality paper.

US Photo Printing Market

  • The combined U.S. photo printing market in 2016 was estimated at $10.1 billion, excluding home printing and instant. The consumer retail segment was estimated to have reached $3.8 billion in 2016. This represents 176 million print orders—8.2 billion printed units (prints, photo books, greeting cards, wall décor and calendars). And 47% of them were printed at off-site print service providers. Growing, it is forecast to reach $4.5 billion in 2018.
  • The market size, measured by revenue, of the Online Photo Printing industry is $3.5 billion in 2020. The market size of the Online Photo Printing industry in the US has grown 4.1% per year on average between 2015 and 2020.
  • Portraits are only 9% of this market, and this includes all portraits. Using this information, one can assume that visa and passport printing is a very minute part of the printing market.
  • When we take into account that the market research only focuses on e-passports and visas and that printing these pictures is such a small part of the overall market, it makes sense that there is not a lot of research devoted to such a small segment. It would not be profitable for the company to do so.

DIY Passport & Visa Photos

  • There is evidence that there are several ways to make DIY passport and visa photos easier for the applicant to complete on their own, further diluting the market.
  • The US State Department now provides a cropping tool to make photos easier to submit.
  •  MyPassportPhotos.com will guide you through the process.
  •  Passport Photo Booth (iOS | Android) helps you with the photo composition needed for passport photos, showing you exactly where to pose within the frame. You can e-mail or save the image for free, or pay extra to have your passport pictures printed.

Walgreens Passport & Visa Photos

  • Walgreens does not separate normal printing from passport printing in any media statements.
  • Passport photos cost $14.99 for two 2x2 inch photos.

UPS Passport & Visa Photos

  • UPS does not share details on the number of photos they take.

Fedex Passport & Visa Photos

  • It takes six to eight weeks for the U.S. State Department to process passports -- an increase from four to six weeks -- but FedEx Office will offer passport processing as fast as 24 hours from 2,000 FedEx Office locations or online.
  • They did not share any details as to the volume processed.

CVS Passport & Visa Photos

  • CVS’s passport photo service includes taking your photo, ensuring it meets State Department regulations, and printing the required two copies for a total cost of $13.99.
  • They did not share any details as to the volume processed.

TAM US Passport & Visa Photos

  •  42% of Americans have passports.
  • There are 328 million people in the US.
  • Not counting renewals, this would mean the TAM for new passports is 190.24 million. (328*.58)
  • It can be assumed that Visa pictures would be a much smaller number. Unfortunately, time did not allow us to triangulate these numbers, as this is a much more difficult process with multiple regulations.

Countries That Allow Passport & Visa Photos Printed At Home

  • There are no precompiled lists with this information.
  • In Canada, passport photos must be taken by a commercial photographer or taken in a studio.
  • In the US, photos can be printed at home.
  • Many countries, like Venezuela, have multiple regulations for the photos, but do not stipulate that they can't come from a home printer. Vietnam is the same.

Results of Initial Research

  • Unfortunately, there is little information available about this market. This is most likely due to the very small size of this market.
  • Locating Visa information received the least amount of research time, due to time constraints. Presearch indicates that we can most likely provide the number of Visas applied for each year in the US.
  • There was no published information from companies that take photos about the number of photos taken for this purpose yearly. It is not advisable to continue this research path.
  • During this initial research block we did not find a country that explicitly stated pictures could be printed at home other, than the US. We did find that many countries do not explicitly state is against regulations.