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Well you can always write, "thanks for getting back to me, but I found a photographer that suites my wants and needs for this."
Or something along those lines.
Just say, "thanks, but your packages don't quite fit my needs at this time".
It's the truth! She should perhaps learn to tailor her packages to her clients and get more work that way.
I'm blunt. I would just tell her everything. My response would be:
"Thank you for providing me with the information my fiance and I required. We were looking for a photographer that would communicate easily and quickly with us. Also due to our budget constraints, we need a photographer that was willing to customize their packages if their current packages did not provide what we need. Since you were unable to meet both of those requirements with your delayed responses to our emails, and your unwillingness to negotiate your packages to exclude a wedding album we have decided to go with another photographer.
Sincerely,
Ms. KateMW"
I would reply and tell her that you have found a photographer that will work with you to give you exactly what you need.
Our photographer has a standard package and when we told her that it was more than we need and out of our price range, she worked with us to customize the package. She was great about it and we are so happy with her so far.
Seriously, in this economy, you'd think peoepl would be going out of their way to accomadate their clients!
I had this same experience with a florist! It was a florist in my town that i used to use all the time (they sell flowers and nick nacky things). I am no longer using them! That is is how I vented about her lack of service!
I'm really surprised she wasn't willing to customize a package for you. Every wedding is unique; it would be a good business practice to make your services easily customizable.
We had/are having a similar problem with a caterer we really wanted. We were seriously jumping up and down when we first found them b/c we were so excited, but then she started averaging 6 days to return e-mails and phone calls, if she even returned them at all, and also not even answering our questions when she did. While that was going on, we had another caterer trying really hard to get our business. It's really refreshing to have someone work for your business.
This photog lady isn't willing to do that, for whatever reason. I agree with Chela429. You should tell her exactly why you aren't going with her, in a professional way of course. This caterer finally e-mailed me back (two weeks later!) and I told her basically that while we were interested in still meeting with her, we were very close to signing with another caterer, and we moved forward with it because she wasn't returning our calls or e-mails. She hasn't e-mailed me back (shocking) yet, but we'll see what she says. 
Good luck!
See, I thought that she would totally work with me after telling her we were already married, etc. WTF would we need with an engagement shoot? Grrr. Oh well, I think I really liked her because her deposit was less then the others. I hate big deposits! :) But, apparently you get what you pay for, which is not much! The photographer that I really love has a deposit that is three times that of this photographer {$1500}, but she's great and will do a photobooth for us, which I really want. I was wooed by the cheap deposit. Bad Kate!
Yeah, Kate, definitely good you're not going with this lady. Obviously would not end up going well down the road. I don't know that you need to be quite so blunt, but I woudl say as other said, just that thank you, but we will be going with someone who was able to tailor a package to our needs. Thank you for your time.
GL and I Hope you find someone way better (and nicer!)
Kara
Insert name here~
I really need somebody that will do a custom package for me. I see that's not something you're interested in doing. Thanks for your time and have a nice day.
~KateMW
That's what I wrote. It's more snarky then I wanted it to be, but I tried. ;)
I agree completely with you on the timeliness - or lack there of in her respones...that's a pet peeve of mine...and it's amazing how many people in general are bad about communication these days! While that starts things off on the wrong foot - not customizing the package really depends on way too many different things...how her business model is set up, pricing/profit structure, how badly she needs or wants the business, etc....not all vendors need to or want to customize. Who knows what her situation or real reasoning is....for us, while we'll customize packages, and try to help people meet their budgets, there's still a magic minimum charge for the day that we have to meet to be a real business and livelihood, and not just a profitable hobby. We restructure things all the time for couples, even working great deals for anywhere that we may want to travel - but we have to turn away plenty of couples too that we just can't cut costs enough for. In response to her, I would probably vote for being nice and professional, and just letting her know that you really needed someone who could customize something for you, and that her lack of timiliness didn't help either.
She wrote me back and offered two extra hours in place the album and e-shoot. I'm not sure I can do it though, because she ticked me off with the lack of email. Hmmm.
I'd still avoid her. It took you being snarky to get what you wanted--and you still want the photobooth, right? Good luck :)
Two extra hours of coverage in exchange for that?...I'm assuming you still pay the regular price, just get the two hours? Not exactly a reasonable trade....without worrying too much about it, I would probably avoid just based on the communication times alone....but that's just me. :)
I find that whenever I take the time to tell a vendor I'm not choosing them, they either get angry and argumentative or just don't respond to me at all. I always end up regretting it and from now on will not inform any vendors I will not be using their services.
I agree with you that she could have been nicer, but honestly I think you weren't very patient. The 29th to the 5th is about five business days, isn't it? That's "FOREVER"? Seriously? Still, I would say if you had to email twice before they responded they probably need to work on their customer service. You can always return the favor and don't respond to their emails! They probably won't like that much, lol.
If you like the other photographer (say photo 1) who requires a higher deposit, have you tried negotiating with photo 1 to see if he would accept a lower deposit? I would not pick the photographer over the amount of the deposit. And Photo 1 includes a photobooth. Photo 2 requires a lower deposit, but no photo booth, no response timeliness, and no willingness to work with you.
Go with photo 1. In either case, you have to pay 100%.
I'm probably going to go with #1 and just deal with the deposit. I just hate deposits! :) I have a planning day at my venue at the end of September. I'm meeting with three of my favorite photographers in person, so we'll see what happens after that.
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OK, I have to get this off my chest before I write something bad to the vendor...
The backstory~I have a small list of about 10 photographers to pick from for my venue. I knew that going in, so it's not a problem, but I do have to work harder to find a photographer I like. I'm also in more of a hurry to book since once they're all booked, I don't know what I do.
So, anyway I've been contacting photographers for the last two weeks, asking for prices, packages and sample weddings. Most have gotten back to me with all of this by the next day, if not the same day. One photographer, who I really liked, took FOREVER to get back to me and I had to send two emails before I got the price list. Seriously, I emailed her for the first time July 29th and didn't get the price/package list until August 5th. It was just form email reply as well, how hard is that to send? So, on the 5th I replied and asked basically if she did custom packages. I asked tow specific questions, one about removing the album from the package and the other about not needing the e-shoot that was included, since we were renewing our vows. Well, I didn't hear back from here until yesterday from that email and it said "Sorry it's taken so long and we don't give any discounts, here are the weddings you wanted to see". Grrrr. I mean wtf? It's taken two weeks to get this information and she couldn't be a little nicer? Has she forgotten I'm paying her? The tone of the email was very annoying, not to mention that she's saying if I want the hours {6-7} I need, I HAVE to get a package that includes the e-shoot and some huge album that is just not our style. I wrote her back and asked, what they did when brides didn't want the album and she wrote back and said she's never had it happened. That's all. She did finally say I could use the amount for a print credit, but that's a lot of prints! I'm not sure I need $1500 worth of prints.
I'm not going to use her, mainly because it turns out her full weddings aren't that great, but it's obvious that our personalities aren't going to mess very well either.
My question is do I respond to her last email with a thanks, but no thanks and do I tell her the real reason?