How much should you pay for design services?

Well, that's a burning question on many of my client's minds. I've heard fellow business owners say that they hired a designer and it was expensive. My opinion is that "expensive" is a relative term. What is considered expensive to one, may not be to another. Am I side stepping this question? Sort of.

Each project deserves its own customized price. You can't charge a small business, say a licensed massage therapist that runs her business by herself, the same price as you would a larger company, like Energizer. I've done work for both of these clients and each deserves a fair and reasonable price.

This brings us back to what is considered fair and reasonable for graphic design services. When I'm quoting a new project, I start with my base pricing structure at $50 to $80 per hour. I then estimate how many hours a particular project will take to complete. A typical logo project can run anywhere from $400 on up to $5,000. It just depends on how complex the client's needs are. A corporate identity project that includes a logo design and a full corporate identity packet (sometimes these are more than 100 pages) are on the higher end of the scale.

If I'm approached by a client that just wants a logo to use on her website, business cards and collateral material, then that would fall in the lower end of pricing. This doesn't mean that she is receiving a lesser quality logo, she is receiving a lesser amount of research and identity rules to her logo. I will spend less time with this project and therefore the cost will be less.

This is where many high-end designers disagree... and yes, I do consider myself a high-end designer. For me, high-end means that I went to school to learn design and know the general rules of graphic design and when I can break them or not. I am an expert in the software I use (mainly Adobe Creative Suite) and try to keep up with the industry standards and what other designers are doing and saying. And, my vendors love me because my files come to them very clean and organized. I see these things as qualifiers for a high-end designer.

I am trying to take a stand for the small business owner and provide fair pricing options. I do great work, for a great price. A lot of design and marketing firms will charge huge amounts of money for their work and it's really not all that great. I've worked with many of these firms and have gotten incredibly frustrated when looking over their pricing. When I was working full-time for someone else, we were quoted over $800,000 for one year's worth of work. What services did this cover? Not enough to warrant my company spending this amount of money, but my boss went ahead and hired them.

I was continually disappointed with their work. They were egotistical and hard to work with. They made mistakes, big ones! The senior designer even sent a package design off to press where she "guessed" at the dimensions. Guess what... that turned out to be an $11,000 mistake. It seemed like they were playing with Monopoly money, only it was my company's money and it was real.

A few months later, my boss fired them. They weren't worth their weight in salt. I still can't figure out why she hired them in the first place. I think there is an allure with certain price points. If it's expensive, then it must be good quality. Not always true.

I have since left that company and have branched out on my own with Studio3b. I thank God every day for that decision. Not only do I have freedom to give fair pricing, but I get to create great work to my clients without the egotistical nonsense that I have had to endure when working with high priced, low productivity firms.