How much should a logo and brand cost for a small business?
Anywhere from the price of a lunch to the price of a car, and the difference is rarely the drawing. What you are paying for is the thinking that decides what gets drawn. My own identity work starts at $5,000, and an identity with a website starts at $8,500.
Why is the range so wide?
Because “a logo” describes four very different purchases.
- A marketplace or contest logo. You get a file. Nobody asks about your business, because the price doesn’t leave room for questions.
- A freelance designer. You get design built from your brief. If your brief is good, this can work well. Most people don’t have a brief.
- A strategist and designer. The brief comes out of a real conversation about your business, and the design is built from it. This is where I work.
- An agency. A team, account managers, and months. Right for companies with many stakeholders, and priced for them.
What does the cheap logo leave out?
- The questions. Nobody finds out what makes you different, so the logo could belong to anyone in your industry.
- The system. A logo alone is not a brand. You need colors, type, and rules for using them, or every new thing you make looks like a different company.
- The files. Versions for dark backgrounds, small sizes, print, and the web.
- Certainty that it is yours. Ask any designer where the mark came from, and ask a trademark attorney before you build a business on it.
The most expensive logo is the one you pay for twice.
What do I charge?
Every project starts with brand therapy, which is $600. The full amount comes off any package booked within 90 days.
- The Spark, $2,500. One day, together, and you leave with a 1 to 3 page website with a booking link live, and your business email connected. Website only. You bring the words and the photos. Brand therapy still comes first, and this is the one package it is not credited against.
- The Shine, starting at $5,000. Logo, color, typography, tagline direction, and a brand book, plus the pieces you use every day: LinkedIn templates for your business page and your personal profile, and an email signature or business cards. About a week.
- The Stage, starting at $5,000. A custom website of about five pages for a brand you already own, with SEO built in.
- The Spotlight, starting at $8,500. The Shine and a five-page website, designed together.
- The Showstopper, starting at $15,000. For established companies and growing teams, with a larger website.
Every price is a starting point, shaped by your diagnosis. The prices are published so you can budget, not so you have to choose alone.
What should a small service business spend?
Enough to get the thinking done once. If the budget is tight, spend it on the diagnosis first. A written diagnosis with a modest logo will serve you better than a lavish logo built on a guess.
Who owns the work?
You do. All of it. The files, the website, the domain, the content. Ask this of anyone you hire.
Sound like you?
Everything starts with a free twenty-minute hello, where we both decide whether this is a fit. Or take the Brand Smart Check first: ten questions, about three minutes, and a straight answer.