This IS how most service industry firms work. In the end we decided to switch to hourly billing. So you either create a crazy scale of products like “simple logo design,” “Average logo design,” “Complex logo design” and “Ultimate logo design” OR you switch to hourly billing. What does a “logo” really mean? I could spend 1 hour on a logo and I could also spend 50 hours on a logo. This is where the flaws in the flat-rate billing system begin to surface. I COULD design them a logo in about an hour. They would say: “900 DOLLARS?!! All I want is a little logo – it will only take you an hour!” And they were right. But for the little guy, I would practically knock them off their feet when I told them I was charging $900 for a logo. This was a fair price for a big company that wanted lots of concepts and revisions. Cost is not a deterrent for these larger companies. Obviously – a company’s brand is VERY important. As I began working with larger and larger companies they wanted more concepts, more revisions, more discussion about their logo. Some of those logo projects, however, took a really long time. Most people thought this was a fair rate and I got lots of work. When I started I charged $300 for a logo. And, so long as my prices were really low it worked out fairly well.
I know that when I am buying something – I like to know what I’m going to pay up-front. When we started I was really in love with the concept of Flat-Rate billing. Currently Go Media charges $100/hr for print design and $125/hr for web and multimedia work. But if you want to survive in the long-run you can’t make it charging $5/hr. You will lose some customers when you raise your rates. I think this is a really good strategy for the designer that is just starting out: start with really low rates and when you get busy enough increase the amount you charge.
Every time I was slammed with work I would up my price. Soon I had all the $100 flyer jobs that I could handle. Now obviously, with me putting in so much work and charging so little, word got around fast. This sucks, but I was doing what I loved. I would spend two days (20+ hours) doing an elaborate illustration for the flyer. For example – I was charging $100 to design a flyer. When Go Media started I was charging flat-rates. Obviously, when you’re starting out you’ll be charging almost nothing. This largely depends on how skilled you are and how many customers you have. How do I send invoices and track sales? What should I charge?
AVERAGE PRICE PER HOUR OF FLYER DESIGNER HOW TO
I thought I would share with you some financial lessons I’ve learned while building Cleveland Graphic Design Firm Go Media over the last fifteen years.Īnd be sure to check out “ How to Charge For Your Graphic Design Work (& Get What You Deserve)” – another post by Go Media, for more on this topic! For more information, head to Ī lot of designers ask us what they should charge for their services. To meet the author and learn more about pricing, contracts, collections and more, attend our design retreat: WMC: Off-The-Grid this October 5 -7th.