Clients ask what a new identity will cost. It’s a fair question with a misleading answer, because the design fee is usually the smallest number in the whole budget.
The rest arrives slowly, over two or three years, in invoices nobody connected to the rebrand when they signed off the logo.
Where the Money Goes
When we added up the real cost of the last six identities we launched, the design work was never more than a third of it.
A brand isn’t bought once. It’s rented every day, by everyone who has to use it.
What to Budget For
These are the costs we now put in front of a client in the first week, before anyone has seen a sketch:
- Licences. Fonts priced per user, per website and per app, renewed every year.
- Replacement. Signs, vans, uniforms and the boxes still sitting in the warehouse.
- Templates. Decks, documents and social formats, built properly once so nobody improvises.
- Training. An afternoon for every team that will make things with the brand.
How We Plan for It
We design with the running costs in view. A typeface with a fair licence, a palette that prints on cheap stock and a system that doesn’t need a designer for every poster all save more than they cost.
You don’t have to replace every sign on launch day. Write down what changes now, what changes at the next reprint and what simply wears out. Then stick to it.
The cheapest rebrand is the one that’s still working in year five. That’s the number we try to design for.
- Budgets
- Brand systems
- Strategy
Tomás Aguiar
Tomás leads strategy from the Lisbon studio. He reads annual reports for fun and asks every client what the brand will cost them in year three.
