What Is Olivia Plath’s Job? The ‘Welcome to Plathville’ Star Has a Booming Photography Business
Olivia Plath is more than a reality TV personality. The 25-year-old might be best known for starring in TLC’s Welcome to Plathville, but that’s not all she has going on. She’s also an entrepreneur with her own photography business.
Olivia Plath works as a wedding photographer
Like her husband Ethan Plath, Olivia grew up in a conservative Christian family. She and her nine brothers and sisters were raised in rural Virginia, where they were homeschooled by their parents. When Olivia was a teen, she and her parents attended a camp for Christian families, which is where she met Ethan. A few years later, the two married.
Neither Olivia nor Ethan attended college, but that hasn’t stopped them from building successful careers. He works as a mechanic restoring old cars, while she pours her energy into her photography business. Over the past few years, she’s built a thriving business photographing weddings and elopements all over the world. On her Instagram, you can see images from celebrations she’s captured in Las Vegas, Alaska, New York City, Chicago, and more.
“I’m a traveling photographer for wild-at-heart lovers and telling people’s stories makes my world go round,” she says on her website.
So, how much does it cost to hire Olivia to shoot a wedding? Like many in-demand wedding photographers, her services don’t come cheap. A standard wedding package is $6,000. That includes Olivia’s travel to domestic locations, unlimited wedding day coverage, help during the planning process, and a digital gallery of photos. An elopement package is $3,100. That includes her travel, six hours of coverage, help with planning, and an online gallery of photos. International weddings require a custom quote.
Additional services include an engagement session for $600, portrait sessions ($600-$850), and rehearsal/rehearsal dinner coverage for $350.
How much does the ‘Welcome to Plathville’ star make from TV?
Of course, working as a wedding photographer isn’t Olivia’s job. Presumably, she and Ethan also make some money from appearing on Welcome to Plathville, though details about their specific salaries aren’t public. However, they might not earn as much from the show as some people think. Cast salaries for cable reality series like Welcome to Plathville generally aren’t huge, though typically, the longer a show airs, the more the cast will get paid.
“For those docu-ensembles, especially if they’re nobodies, per episode it ranges from low-end, like $1,500 an episode, to $3,000 at the high end,” an agent told Business Insider in 2016. “And then after three years of success, it can go up to $7,000 to $10,000 an episode. After that, you start moving into the Kardashian level.”
In some cases, reality stars make even less than those estimates. Deavan Clegg of 90 Day Fiancé: The Other Way, which also airs on TLC, recently said that she and her then-husband Jihoon Lee made only $1,000 per episode and that she had to cover a lot of her own expenses, including travel costs. And the money didn’t come right away.
“[F]or season 2 I wasn’t paid out completely until almost a year after filming,” she wrote on her Instagram Story, according to In Touch. “Severely underpaid for everything.”
Welcome to Plathville Season 5 premieres Tuesday, Sept. 5 at 10 p.m. ET on TLC.
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