the fact that this blog is up and running, that's what!
Monday, October 22, 2007
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Thomas Friedman covers Green For All
We are honored to work with people who make a difference in the world. One such group is found in Oakland at Green For All.Green For All's founder, Van Jones was interviewed for Thomas Friedman's Op-ed in the today's New York Times. This recognition is due and is just a sliver of the light that needs to be shed upon this worthy cause.
We are proud to have worked on the Green For All website.
Follow the link below to read the full article.
The Green-Collar Solution
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Van Jones has been on a crusade to help disadvantaged
communities understand why they would be the biggest
beneficiaries of a greener America.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10
Friday, October 12, 2007
Buying Deisgn
Many first time entrepreneurs, marketing or product professionals are unsure as to how to buy design services. There is a reason for this; it can be a complicated process full of exceptions. As with any purchase the more you know going in to the negotiation, the more comfortable you are with the outcome. In our experience, there are 5 factors to bear in mind when discussing pricing with a design agency.
First, hourly cost versus project cost. This is likely the most common questions designers and agencies face. It is a variation of "what can you do in 5 hours?" or "what is your hourly rate?". The truth is that anyone can work within a fixed budget or fixed constraint of time. However, if this is a first time project, a re-branding campaign or a large web project, the best bet is to solicit an overall proposal of work and budget and measure that against the expected returns and determine whether or not it makes financial sense. Once the overall design look and feel is established, supporting or satellite projects are better negotiated at some sort of constrained rate (hourly, monthly).
The second most important point to take into consideration when purchasing design is your time to market. If it is late in the game and you need to catch up, that means the design firm needs to constrain its schedule and the client needs to provide feedback timely. This is when rush fees get incurred. Rush fees can range anywhere from 50% to 100% of the previously negotiated cost so it is important to negotiate these fees and their triggers up-front so there are no surprises on the invoice.
Third, photography, illustrations and touch-up work are always billed separately. Photography, whether it be an original shoot or stock, will be billed at cost plus a mark up to cover the administrative costs of handling the task and the risk of making those decisions on behalf of the client. A client can provide his own artwork but in both cases, any touch-up work is billed out an hourly rate. That hourly rate should be agreed to ahead of time and noted in the contract.
Similar to photography is printing. Printing costs are always covered by the client and often billed directly to the client. The agency will bill an administrative fee on top of the cost for the time it takes to manage the process as well as the risk being incurred in making final decisions on behalf of the client with regard to printing. For example, during a press-check of a corporate brochure a representative of the design firm will provide feedback to the printer on the colors and placement of the artwork. Once it is corrected to her satisfaction she will give the go-ahead to run the job. The mark up on the print job covers this work. Again, this percentage should be agreed to up front and noted in the contract.
The fifth and final pricing issue covered in this note is copyright. It is standard industry practice for the design agency to retain copyright ownership over the artwork or design being contracted. This is similar to a recording artist retaining copyright even though he sells an album. The reason for this is not so the agency can re-sell it, license it or otherwise profit from original work provide to a client. Rather, it is because the agency is producing the design for a specific use, not a general use. For example, a movie poster created for next week's box office release, can not be re-used as a web banner for the movie a month later. The poster was designed and produced and licensed to the buyer for its use as a poster. If, however, the movie house purchased the copyright to the poster, they are free to use it as they wish. Industry standard pricing is 75% to 100% over the agreed to fee.
Too often these topics can be sticking points between clients and agencies when in reality if discussed upfront and clearly delineated in the contract, they do note need to get in the way of the fun part, the design. So, now that we know all of the pricing questions to ask, call us with your project and lets get started.
By: SWC
First, hourly cost versus project cost. This is likely the most common questions designers and agencies face. It is a variation of "what can you do in 5 hours?" or "what is your hourly rate?". The truth is that anyone can work within a fixed budget or fixed constraint of time. However, if this is a first time project, a re-branding campaign or a large web project, the best bet is to solicit an overall proposal of work and budget and measure that against the expected returns and determine whether or not it makes financial sense. Once the overall design look and feel is established, supporting or satellite projects are better negotiated at some sort of constrained rate (hourly, monthly).
The second most important point to take into consideration when purchasing design is your time to market. If it is late in the game and you need to catch up, that means the design firm needs to constrain its schedule and the client needs to provide feedback timely. This is when rush fees get incurred. Rush fees can range anywhere from 50% to 100% of the previously negotiated cost so it is important to negotiate these fees and their triggers up-front so there are no surprises on the invoice.
Third, photography, illustrations and touch-up work are always billed separately. Photography, whether it be an original shoot or stock, will be billed at cost plus a mark up to cover the administrative costs of handling the task and the risk of making those decisions on behalf of the client. A client can provide his own artwork but in both cases, any touch-up work is billed out an hourly rate. That hourly rate should be agreed to ahead of time and noted in the contract.
Similar to photography is printing. Printing costs are always covered by the client and often billed directly to the client. The agency will bill an administrative fee on top of the cost for the time it takes to manage the process as well as the risk being incurred in making final decisions on behalf of the client with regard to printing. For example, during a press-check of a corporate brochure a representative of the design firm will provide feedback to the printer on the colors and placement of the artwork. Once it is corrected to her satisfaction she will give the go-ahead to run the job. The mark up on the print job covers this work. Again, this percentage should be agreed to up front and noted in the contract.
The fifth and final pricing issue covered in this note is copyright. It is standard industry practice for the design agency to retain copyright ownership over the artwork or design being contracted. This is similar to a recording artist retaining copyright even though he sells an album. The reason for this is not so the agency can re-sell it, license it or otherwise profit from original work provide to a client. Rather, it is because the agency is producing the design for a specific use, not a general use. For example, a movie poster created for next week's box office release, can not be re-used as a web banner for the movie a month later. The poster was designed and produced and licensed to the buyer for its use as a poster. If, however, the movie house purchased the copyright to the poster, they are free to use it as they wish. Industry standard pricing is 75% to 100% over the agreed to fee.
Too often these topics can be sticking points between clients and agencies when in reality if discussed upfront and clearly delineated in the contract, they do note need to get in the way of the fun part, the design. So, now that we know all of the pricing questions to ask, call us with your project and lets get started.
By: SWC
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