Your new cheap (STOLEN) design can land you in trouble.

I’m a designer. A real designer.
Meaning, I take pride in coming up with unique and original solutions for my clients.
I am very protective of the work I have created for them and I don’t take kindly to others stealing it for themselves.

There are laws.
This is not the wild west where anything goes.
Why is it, in 2015, people think that they can take whatever they want off the internet, repackage it, and sell it cheaply to another? They don’t believe they’ll get caught?
To go with this question, how is it that people believe that they are getting unique and customized work from a designer that only charges $5?

Many years ago, back in the early 90s, I designed a logo for a Toronto Comedy Club named “Comedywood”.
Because the most iconic symbol in this city is our tower, we (the client and I) decided that the character behind the logo should feature such.
I sketched and I sketched and I sketched some more, and eventually, I created the final piece that hung large in lights, high above a popular shopping plaza in this city where the club was located. It was well known. If you look closely, you’ll see that the lines in the logo aren’t perfect and there’s a lot of unevenness because I didn’t use computer vector arches and graphics, I freehandedly cartooned this logo using a pen.

What’s mind boggling is that for some strange reason, it is the most ripped off logo that I have ever created.

Thanks to reverse Google image search, I am able to find instances where this logo has been stolen and recycled on an ongoing basis. I’ve even seen it featured in a (foreign) designer’s portfolio. And as I mentioned, believing that this is not a free-for-all, I personally follow up on each and every one of these copyright infractions.

I usually start with a polite note of “you are using my work without permission so please remove it” and only ONE time have I received an apology.
Usually, the answers I receive are “F you”, “WTF?” and my all time favourite which happened to me this week “your problem doesn’t lie with me. It lies with the designer I hired”.

Actually, legally, my problem DOES lie with you as you are publicly using my work and showcasing it to promote yourself and/or your services.
But, I don’t believe the world is full of intelligence or those that fully understand the rules, so (as a nice guy) I’m willing to let this one slide.

However, my problem right now DOES lie with the designer. He’s the one that tried to pass off my work as his own.
Knowingly.
Deceitfully.

Want a logo for $5? You get what you pay for.
But don’t be surprised if you get a call/letter/email from the designer who actually created it, or even worse, a lawyer stating that you now owe somebody a whole lot more. 

Why a logo should cost more than $100.

You see it everywhere. Logos advertised for $99, designers promising unlimited concepts for under $200, and you’ve had some potential clients quickly disappear when you gave them (what you considered) a cheap quote.

After almost 20 years of working in the advertising and design industry on some of the world’s most recognized brands, it amazes me to see what I actually consider the HARDEST and most time consuming of creative projects cheapened in the eyes of the general public and made readily available by designers wearing blinders to what realistic and acceptable fees should be for this type of work.

Of course, I know I will get the usual comments of “what is acceptable is what people are willing to charge” but creating a logo for a new company, product or service should not come with a measly $100 price tag.

Here is my reasoning…

To design the correct look and feel of a company, you must first RESEARCH the company. Who are they catering to? What’s the target audience? What is the look they want to convey? Do they want 3 concepts or do they want 10? Is it a simple solution or will you have to go back to the drawing board 20 times? Studying and learning about your client’s business and their objectives takes time. I’m going to give this part of the project a very modest one day worth of work. One day to visit my client’s business, to research their competition’s websites, to examine their target audience, and to find examples of logos created for similar clients. If I am to charge an industry average of $50/hour, working one day from 9:00am – 5:00pm (with one hour for lunch), I am billing for 7 hours. This is a $350 fee.

Part 2 is the concept stage. I always give at least 3 concepts. Whether you use a marker or you go straight to the computer, it doesn’t really matter how you begin, you are looking at an empty page or screen. Can you simply splash it quickly and spew out creativity? Sometimes you can. If you are creating the logo for a dog walking service, you might start with a dog. But what happens when your client is a law firm or a company that manufactures sheet metal? The first rule of thumb is to avoid the first things that pop into your head.

Creating a great logo is like sipping cognac or smoking a fine cigar. You want to do it slowly. You must appreciate the craftsmanship and the process. I like to come up with something to start, and then I walk away. I do something else. I then come back later with fresh eyes and look at it again. Repeat this until you have something you believe the client will fall in love with that best represents their objective. Then do it two more times for the next concepts. All of this takes time.

Of course, I like to give myself about 2 weeks to go back and forth to the drawing board. But for arguments sake, let’s factor in one day per concept. One day to create and polish one design. So, 3 days in total. Once again, using the 7 hours at $50/hour, this stage would create a fee of $1,050.

Stage 3 is presentation. Are you sending your ideas as a PDF through email or are you meeting with the client? If you are meeting with the client, factor in some additional charges for travel time and presentation.

Stage 4. Everybody’s favourite. The revision stage. Very rarely will you nail something that the client quickly approves. I’ve had it happen several times over the years but typically, there are going to be revisions.

The client showed it to 8 friends and they all had opinions. The client’s spouse wants to see it in orange, then in yellow, then in blue. They love the icon but want you to play around with the font. They love the font but want you to tweak the icon. The logo is great but they wanted something more feminine. The logo is feminine but they were thinking something more cartoon-like. The list goes on.

Truthfully, most clients have no idea what they want and will beat even the greatest concept into the ground because they are indecisive. A decisive client is one that you should bend over backwards for and cater to their every whim because they are few and far between. They are the difference between loving what you do and wishing you could flee to cut the neighbour's grass for a living.

3 more days of revisions and back and forths (again, I’m being modest).

Add another $1,050 to the quote.

Taking all these factors into consideration, you have a quick estimation of what a logo design should cost from an intermediate designer for any small, start-up client.

The quote, taking all of my points into consideration is at $2,450.

This does not take into consideration all the other variables associated with logo design work. Will the logo be prominent on the side of a downtown skyscraper? Will the client want to buy the exclusive rights? Etc. etc. etc.

How you charge and what you charge is up to you. But by taking the time from concept to completion into consideration, the amount you paid for your education, computer and software, your phone conversations, travel, amount of revisions you will most likely encounter, be honest with yourself, how much is it worth?

Remember when you were young, and you practiced your signature over and over and over again until you hit that eureka moment and finally came up with something that defined you? Was it easy? It wasn’t. This is what you are doing for your client.

And it’s worth a hell of a lot more than $100.

Until next time, keep dreaming.

ISTOCK now sells logos?

I have a ton of work to do this morning. Yet here I sit, knowing that I must say SOMETHING in regards to ISTOCKPHOTO’s announcement that they will begin selling logos (for lower than standard pricing) sometime in the near future. I’m not even going to bother editing this one because of time restrictions, so if there are grammatical errors on this post, I apologize. Just last week, I wrote my blog article “We have become cheap whores” and it is still being circulated around the world. I think my timing was quite good because after yesterday’s ISTOCK announcement, I saw it circulate again and we have some huge protests taking place from designers on both sides of the fence. On one side, is the uproar from people that have made a handsome living over the years in this industry and understand a brand’s worth. On the other, people that welcome the fact that there is possibly a market for whatever they can produce. As one “designer” wrote on the site’s message board… “WOW, Just GREAT. Now I have a reason to learn illustrator as I have been wanting to for some time”. Nuff said. After reading pages upon pages of comments from wannabe designers congratulating ISTOCK for this new endeavour, I realize that in the design world of today, true professional and passionate creatives have become the minority. Now, here are some facts and questions as to why I sit on both sides of the fence on this idea. I’ll start with the negative. First is the most obvious. I charge my “friends and family” $2,000 for a logo. For clients, I start at $2,500. And I have always been fairly busy. The reason I charge this rate is because I know a logo is NOT in the same category as clip art. In fact, I believe that a logo design is the hardest thing I can produce. I have been known to create award-winning ad concepts in one day, but for the new look of the dental office down the street, I like to give myself around 3 weeks. The client must be researched. I need to know what kind of clientele they are targeting. I need to know how they want to project themselves in the marketplace. I need to know many factors before I put pen to paper. And then I need to explore different avenues and ideas for the client. Often, a logo is born by making a move (while tinkering for days) with a design until I end up shouting “Eureka”. Then I do it all over again for the next concept. Is this whole process really only worth a few hundred dollars? Remember when you were young, and you practiced your signature over, and over, and over again until you got it perfect? How much would you have paid to have somebody come up with that for you? What if I could give you a signature that got a WOW response everytime somebody saw it? How much would you have paid for that? This is what we do and why we charge more than a few hundred bucks for this creativity. ISTOCK claims that you should submit your third round of logo revisions that the client rejected. This sounds great. Only there was probably a reason the client didn’t want it. In my mind, the fact that they paid me for my creative concepts means that by selling those concepts I have just cheated them. They paid me handsomely for the work, and now somebody gets to use what they threw away for a small fraction of the cost? There are also possible trademark issues and the legal expenses that could be incurred to a company if they end up buying something that has been ripped off. You are a company owner, you buy a logo off the site, you create and pay for all the corporate materials to accommodate it, and the next thing you know, some designer in (insert country here) is suing you for ripping off their work. Seems the “designer” that submitted the logo to the site copied it. Now what? Now we have the factor I fear most. The cheapening of what we do in the eyes of the public and the start-up company owner. “What do you mean you charge $2,500? My brother got a professional looking logo for $100 off one of those sites”. Our service will now be a much harder sell. Here is why I like the ISTOCK logo idea… I have created dozens of logos over the years. My clients generally get a minimum of 3 concepts. Sometimes, I give them more. So, lets say I have created 30 logos over the course of my career…that means I would have around 100 designs to submit to ISTOCK. Let’s say I tell ISTOCK to sell them at a maximum rate of $800 each. I get 50% of that (according to what I have read). $400 x 100 = $40,000. $40,000 and I don’t have to do a damn thing. Like my ISTOCK photo uploads, I’ve already created them and they were just collecting dust anyway. Have I hurt professional photographers with my photo uploads? For one thing, unlike “designers” that will submit logos, I never claimed to be a professional photographer. This is where the difference lies. If my photo has some grain to it, the one downloading it takes that chance. What you see is what you get. As a professional Art Director, I have still hired my fair share of professional photographers for different photo shoots and I have still bought high-end photographs in the $2,500 range for some of my clients. I’m sure logo designs will work the same way. If you are looking for a professional design, hire a professional. If you are looking for something to “make do”, go ahead and download from ISTOCK. Just don’t be upset when it comes around to bite you in the behind down the road. What I find most interesting is that ISTOCK sells photos to designers and art directors like myself. Now, they are going to hurt the business of the very people they rely on to buy their photographs. I believe this is called "biting the hand that feeds you". Here is my take. Sell it for what it is. There should be a biography beside every one of the logo designs on who is submitting them. If somebody (like myself) has an impressive background, qualifications, and numerous awards for their work, they should be allowed to price their designs at whatever they see fit. I may not sell as many designs but I am okay with that. Hopefully companies looking at my work will see that I took the time to create what they are buying. Not that I whipped something together to put a few dollars in my pocket. An amateur with no professional background should not be worth the same rate. In the end, if the world changes, you can fight it or you can go along with it. I’m still undecided on this one. One thing I do know is this… I may be a whore, but as I’ve said before, I’m not a cheap one.

Whore Aftermath

I went from writing absolutely nothing for a few months, to not stopping for 3 days. Updating the events from the first blog post, writing email replies to many, and speaking with a few design organizations and industry websites that have followed up. To everyone that submitted comments and praise in regards to the article and the info it contained, I thank you. This was never about me. I was merely pointing out facts. And after speaking to the RGD (who have really been amazing in regards to all of this), this isn’t about them either. They seem as genuinely concerned as we are, are investigating, and I for one commend them greatly for it. This was about the state of our industry. This is about the freelance website that doesn’t care about standards or guidelines. They only care if they get a piece of the action. No matter how low it may sink. This is about the employer in Toronto that believes $2.00/hour is fair pricing for what we do. And most of all, this is about ALL of us putting our foot down. Somebody said that we should form a union and I should be the Jimmy Hoffa of this industry (minus the unhappy ending to that story). And truth, if I knew I could change things for the better I would seriously consider it. But we all know this is not possible. I could write a blog post (keeping names out of it). I could bring the situation to your attention and hope you get something from it. That was about it. All of this has to do with you. I have turned down many jobs this year (and lost several others) because I have stuck to my guns. I will continue to stick to my guns. I’m not interested in competing with those that feel that $2/hour is acceptable. I poured a lot of sweat into getting to this point in my career and I’ll be damned if anybody is going to have me cheapen that. Make some concessions because it’s a rough economy? Sure. No problem. You need a logo, website, corporate materials and a direct mail postcard? I’ll throw in the postcard design for free. The rest will cost what I believe it is worth. Why? Because if I’m not getting paid what it is worth, I’d sooner do something else. So now what do we do? Do we sign a petition stating that none of us will work below minimum wage? Do we all agree on a standard pricing guidelines? The Graphic Artist’s Guild of America has a book like that. Many don’t follow it. As we discovered this week, even the organizations have their work cut out for them to regulate what their members are up to. It’s entirely up to you as a professional creative. Do you want to keep giving away your work or not? If there isn’t anyone willing to do this cheap work, we’d all be in great shape again. I’ll be the first name. I solemnly swear as a professional creative to not cheapen our industry by working for wages (or contributing to anything) that I feel, de-values us as a whole. I swear to keep up the fight. Ronnie Lebow.