How to Pick the Best Slide Scanning Company

Don't Buy a Lemon: Quality Matters More Than Rock-Bottom Prices

Imagine you're shopping for a car for your spouse. Would you automatically buy the absolute cheapest car available? Of course not—you'd end up with an old clunker that overheats after a few miles and leaves you stranded.

Yet many people approach slide scanning this way. They search only for the lowest price, assuming all scanning services produce identical results. They think they're just buying "a bag of chips" and it doesn't matter where it comes from.

That couldn't be further from the truth.

The difference between scanning services is like the difference between genuine Lay's potato chips and "Fay's" chips made from rotten potatoes fried in rancid grease. The packages might look similar, but what's inside is completely different.

Making a purchase decision based solely on price is rarely a smart strategy.

What You're Really Buying

When you send your precious family slides to be scanned, you're not buying a commodity product. You're entrusting decades of irreplaceable memories to someone who will either:

• Carefully scan each slide at high resolution and professionally edit every image to restore colors and correct fading, OR
• Run your slides through an automated process that produces mediocre, unedited scans with all the fading and discoloration still intact

The price difference between these two approaches might be small. The quality difference is enormous.

See the Difference: The Same Slide, Two Services

We sent the exact same slide to our largest competitor and scanned it ourselves. The results speak for themselves:

What Makes Our Scanning Different

Professional Photoshop Editing on Every Scan: We don't just run your slides through a scanner. Every single slide receives individual attention in Photoshop to restore colors, correct fading, adjust contrast, and optimize the image. This is included in our base price, not an expensive add-on.

True 4,000 ppi Resolution: We scan at genuine 4,000 pixels per inch—not interpolated or inflated numbers. This captures all the detail your slides actually contain.

Personal Care in Wisconsin: Your slides are handled personally by experienced technicians who understand these are irreplaceable family memories, not just another batch to process.

Since 2002: We've been perfecting slide scanning for over 20 years. We've learned what works, what doesn't, and how to get the absolute best results from aging slides.

Questions to Ask Any Scanning Service

Before sending your slides anywhere, ask these critical questions:

• Do you edit every scan, or just run automated processes? (Automated scanning produces the "before" images you saw above)
• What is your actual scanning resolution? (Many advertise inflated numbers)
• Can I see before-and-after examples of real customer slides? (Not stock photos or cherry-picked examples)
• Where will my slides actually be processed? (Some "local" services ship to overseas processing centers)
• What happens if I'm not satisfied? (Understand the return and refund policy before shipping)

We answer all these questions honestly and transparently. We have nothing to hide because we're confident in our quality.

Try Before You Commit

We're so confident in our quality that we offer 10 free demo scans. Send us your 10 most challenging slides—the faded ones, the discolored ones, the ones you think might be unsalvageable. We'll show you exactly what our professional editing can accomplish.

See the difference for yourself. Then decide if the "cheapest price" is really the best value for your irreplaceable memories.