Shutterstock sold pictures the way a gym sells memberships. In 2003, when stock photos were licensed one at a time for steep fees, it launched with a simple subscription: pay a flat amount, download what you need. Nine years later its library held more than 20 million images from over 35,000 contributors in 125 countries. In 2011 customers paid for more than 58 million downloads. In October 2012 the New York company went public.

One Price, Many Pictures

Jon Oringer, a software developer in New York, started Shutterstock in 2003. The bet was that small businesses, bloggers and marketers wanted lots of decent images, cheaply and fast, more than they wanted a few perfect ones. Photographers uploaded their work and earned a cut each time it was downloaded. In 2011 it made $120.3 million in revenue, and about two-thirds came from outside North America.

The Getty Deal That Died

Shutterstock priced 4.5 million shares at $17 in October 2012 and listed on the New York Stock Exchange as SSTK. It later built a business licensing its library as data. In January 2025 it agreed to combine with its old rival, Getty Images. Britain's competition regulator demanded that Shutterstock sell its editorial business first. In mid-2026 the merger agreement was terminated, and Shutterstock remains public on the NYSE.

Cover: The Photographer Sescau, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a photographer at his camera.