Pricing

How we work

We are introducing the concept of [BLOCK]s. It's simple. A [BLOCK] equals 10 hours. A [BLOCK] costs $500. That's only $50 an hour. Sweet deal, eh?

But that does not mean we have a fixed price of $500 for every contract. Not at all.

Our clients authorize all design work in 10 hour increments. After every 10 hours of work, the client can purchase another [BLOCK] if they want us to continue, or they can take the source files to another vendor and have them complete the project. (Note: the client owns the work at all times and may request source files at any time.)

Our typical project

Joe's Bar and Grille (JBG) already has a logo and basic content ready to go for a simple 5-page website. We tell JBG we think the job will take 3 [BLOCK]s. To get started, JBG buys 1 [BLOCK] for $500. We work 10 hours, then meet with JBG, who is happy with the work done thus far and purchases another [BLOCK] for $500. We meet again after another 10 hours of work, and agree that the project is on track and only needs another 3 hours. JBG wants us to finish, so they purchase their 3rd [BLOCK]. The project is finished within 2.4 [BLOCK]s, less than our initial estimate. Since the 3rd [BLOCK] was purchased in advance, the remaining .6 of a [BLOCK] would be considered our profit, right? Wrong. The .6 of a [BLOCK] is credited to JBG's account and can be used towards updates or even a future project. And since JBG saw our work at 10-hour intervals all along, it knew just what to expect from the finished site.

Nobody loses. All time and money is accounted for. No surprises.

How others work

Others use fixed price contracts, but we don't believe in them. It's too hard to predict how much work needs to be done, so there is always a loser. Either the client pays too much, or the contractor doesn't get paid enough for their hard work.

Other's typical project

Joe's Bar and Grille (JBG) already has a logo and basic content ready to go for a simple 5-page website. Web Designer (WD) estimates 30 hours of work need to be done at $50 per hour. WD goes ahead and does all the work, and it turns out to take only 24 hours. JBG pays $1500 for a website that actually cost WD $1200. WD walks away with the $300 difference between estimate and actual. Of course the website took a couple more weeks than JBG expected, and didn't quite look like JBG thought it would. But after paying $1500, JBG didn't want to shell out more to change it.