Geoff Weber,
Founder
June 2026
Dear Friend,
You should not have to pay someone to digitize a box of old media before anyone has determined what is actually inside it.
Yet customers are often expected to identify unfamiliar formats, count hundreds or thousands of items, judge the condition of aging media, and pay based on their best estimate.
That has never made sense to me.
Most people do not know the difference between 8mm and Super 8 film, VHS and VHS-C, or a healthy videotape and one requiring additional care. They should not have to become preservation experts before asking for help.
At Heirloom, we inspect your media first, provide an itemized quote, and let you decide what happens next.
You Do Not Need to Know What You Have
Many collections arrive without an inventory.
A customer may have inherited several boxes from a parent. An attic may contain film reels, slides, photographs, negatives, videotapes, and audio recordings from different decades. Labels may be incomplete, incorrect, or missing entirely.
Sometimes the customer can tell us exactly what is inside. More often, we hear something like, “I have three boxes of old family stuff.”
Both are perfectly acceptable.
Before sending your collection, a rough estimate is helpful. An exact count is not required. You do not need to spend an entire weekend counting photographs or researching obsolete recording formats.
Tell us what you know. Our team will determine the rest.
Old Media Is Not Always What It Appears to Be
Two items that look similar may require very different services.
A videotape may have a damaged case, broken leader, mold, or deteriorating magnetic material. Film can shrink, become brittle, or develop vinegar syndrome. Slides and negatives may be stored in unfamiliar mounts or cut into unusual sizes. Photographs may be loose, mounted in albums, or attached to fragile scrapbook pages.
Those differences can affect how the media should be handled and what digitizing will cost.
That is why our published pricing is useful for planning, but a final quote should be based on what you actually sent—not what either of us guessed might be inside the box.
What Heirloom Inspects Before You Decide
When your old media arrives, our team examines the collection to determine:
- The types of media included
- The quantity of each format
- The physical condition of the materials
- Visible damage or deterioration
- Whether special handling may be required
- How the collection is labeled and organized
- Which digitizing services apply
- The expected cost of the project
This inspection gives us enough information to prepare an accurate, itemized quote.
It also gives you something far more important: the ability to make a decision based on facts.
A Reasonable Estimate Is Enough to Begin
We encourage customers to estimate what they have before sending it. That can help you understand the likely size and cost of the project.
Notice that I said estimate—not count everything perfectly.
If you have loose photographs, a one-inch stack may contain approximately 100 standard prints. Count your videotapes and film reels if doing so is easy. Estimate the number of slides or negatives when an exact count would require hours of work.
Your estimate helps us understand the general scope. Our inspection establishes the actual quantity and condition.
You do not need to do our job before allowing us to help you.
Why Heirloom Does Not Require Payment First
A price provided before inspection is still an estimate, even when it is presented as an invoice.
Perhaps you believe you have 500 photographs, but the actual quantity is twice that. Maybe several tapes require repairs. A film reel may be a different format than expected. Some media may not need to be digitized at all.
I would rather identify those things before asking you to approve the project.
That protects you from committing to an unknown total. It also protects the relationship between us. You should not begin a project wondering what additional charges might appear after your memories are already in someone else’s hands.
At Heirloom, inspection comes first. Your decision comes second.
What Happens When Your Old Media Arrives
Our process is straightforward:
- We check in your collection and connect it with your contact information.
- We identify, count, and classify the different media formats.
- We examine the physical condition of the collection.
- We document visible damage and any special preservation concerns.
- We prepare an itemized, no-obligation quote.
- We send the quote to you for review and approval.
Digitizing begins only after you understand the project and authorize us to proceed.
If something in the quote is unclear, call us. We will explain what we found and why a particular service or classification applies.
You Decide What Gets Digitized
Receiving a quote does not require you to approve the entire collection.
Some customers choose to preserve everything. Others begin with their videotapes or film reels and save the photographs for later. Some prioritize the recordings connected to a particular person or family event.
You may approve part of the project, ask questions, make changes, or decide not to proceed.
If you decline the quote, we will arrange to return your media. Sending a collection to Heirloom for inspection does not obligate you to purchase our services.
The memories belong to you. The decision should remain yours.
Blank Media and Basic Repairs
A physical inspection cannot always determine whether a videotape, audio cassette, film reel, or disc contains usable content. That may only become clear when we attempt to digitize it.
Heirloom makes a credit for video tapes later determined to be empty.
We also perform the basic repairs we can complete without an additional charge. If an item requires more extensive restoration, specialized handling, or a different service classification, we will explain that before moving forward whenever it can be identified during inspection.
You should pay for memories we can preserve—not for blank recordings or minor problems we can reasonably correct.
Better Information Leads to Better Decisions
Preserving old media can feel overwhelming because so much is unknown.
What formats do I have? Is anything damaged? What should I preserve first? How much will it cost? Am I committing to everything simply by sending it?
Our inspection process is designed to replace those questions with clear answers.
You do not need a perfect inventory. You do not need to understand every format. You do not need to pay before we have examined what you actually own.
Bring or send your old media to Heirloom. We will inspect it, explain what we find, and provide an itemized, no-obligation quote.
Then you decide.
No memory left behind,
