---
title: "Stocksy: Artists Who Own Their Stock Photo Platform"
description: "Photographers and videographers built a cooperative where creators keep the majority of their earnings"
summary: When photographers asked why platforms keep most of what they earn, they built their own. Stocksy has paid over $80 million to artist-members who earn 50-75% of every sale—not the industry-standard pennies.
date: 2026-01-04
tags: ["case-study", "cooperative", "artist-owned", "stock photography", "creative commons"]
categories: ["Creative Communities"]
weight: 4
featureImageCaption: "Photo by [Jakob Owens](https://unsplash.com/@jakobowens1) on [Unsplash](https://unsplash.com/photos/CiUR8zISX60) (Unsplash License)"
---

## What They Needed

Stock photography is a brutal business for creators. The major platforms pay photographers pennies per download—sometimes literally 15-25 cents. The platforms keep most of the revenue. Artists have no say in pricing, licensing terms, or how their work is used.

In 2012, a group of photographers and industry veterans asked: what if the people who create the images owned the platform that sells them?

## What They Built

They created **[Stocksy United](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stocksy_United)**—a stock photography and video cooperative owned by its contributing artists.

The model flipped the industry standard:
- **Artists earn 50-75% of each sale** (compared to 15-45% at competitors)
- **Artists own the company.** Contributors are member-owners with voting rights.
- **Artists govern together.** Major decisions go to the membership.
- **Quality over quantity.** Curated collections rather than endless uploads.

Stocksy runs on a mix of custom-built and open source technology, but the real innovation isn't technical—it's structural. The same images, sold through a cooperative, generate dramatically different outcomes for the people who create them.

## What Happened

A decade later, Stocksy has [paid out over **$50 million to artists**](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stocksy_United).

**The numbers:**
- Over 2,000 artist-members from 65+ countries
- Millions of images and video clips
- Used by major brands, publishers, and agencies worldwide

**What artists say:**

> "I earn more from one Stocksy sale than from dozens of sales on other platforms."

> "For the first time, I feel like a partner, not a supplier."

> "When they made a major policy change, I got to vote on it. That's never happened anywhere else I've contributed."

Stocksy proved that a cooperative model could compete in a market dominated by venture-backed giants. Not by being cheaper or having more content—but by being better for the people who create.

## What They Learned

**Fair pay attracts better work.** When artists keep more of their earnings, they contribute their best work. Stocksy's curated library is known for quality precisely because the economics make it worthwhile for talented photographers to participate.

**Ownership changes behavior.** Artist-owners care about the platform's long-term health, not just their next sale. They contribute to community discussions, mentor new members, and think about sustainability.

**Cooperatives can scale.** Stocksy isn't a small hobby project. It's a real business competing in a global market. The cooperative structure didn't limit growth—it enabled a different kind of growth, one that benefits members rather than extracting from them.

**Curation beats volume.** While competitors race to have the most images, Stocksy focused on having the right images. A smaller, better library serves buyers better and pays artists more per image.

## What This Means for You

If you're part of a creative community—photographers, writers, musicians, designers, illustrators—you don't have to accept extractive platform terms.

The cooperative model works for creative work:
- **[Stocksy](https://www.stocksy.com/)** proved it for photography
- **[Resonate](https://resonate.coop/)** is building it for music
- **[Means TV](https://means.tv/)** is exploring it for video

The tools to build platforms are increasingly accessible. The harder part is organizing your community and designing governance that works. But if photographers can do it, so can you.

**Learn more:** [stocksy.com](https://www.stocksy.com)

---

*The question for creative platforms isn't just "how much do artists get paid?" It's "who owns the platform, and whose interests does it serve?" Stocksy answered both questions the same way: the artists.*
