Oh boy, logo mills. I just want to pull up something from The Graphic Artists Guild Handbook: Pricing and Ethical Guidelines about these kinds of companies. Itâs long but I think itâs worth reading the full thing:
Graphic designers are facing similar assaults on their profession by companies that devalue professional design services by competing unfairly on price with shoddy design, sub-standard services, unfair labor practices, and with no regard to copyright. So-called âlogo millsâ are online operations that hire âdesignersâ at ridiculously low rates to pump out off-the-shelf logos that are marketed to consumers at cut-rate prices. Most of these pre-made logos are simply pieced together clip art with mundane type treatment. The same logos are sold over and over again. Buyers can pay higher prices to get a âuniqueâ logo, which means the company promises not to resell the design and the buyer simply owns the copyright as part of the package. âCustomizationâ may consist of little more than providing the same logo in a different color scheme or with adjustments to the font.
A second type of logo mill offers âoriginalâ logos. The price of their services is based on the number of concepts, rounds of revisions, and designers working on the project (the greater the number, the higher the price), yet their prices are still below the prevailing market rates for professional design services. Their success, despite such low prices, is due to their abusive labor practices, which treat designers as just another expendable commodity instead of highly-trained professionals. Logo mills are the digital sweatshops of the design world. In one such company, designers work on per project basis (earning $25-40 per project) in extremely competitive conditions with no assurance of continued work and no copyright fees. Designers sign up for a project on a first-come, first-served basis. Since multiple designers work on a project, they âcompeteâ to have their design accepted by the client. Successful designers are awarded points as well as a monetary bonus. Designers are required to critique each otherâs work with points being deducted from those whose work is panned. A loss of points mean that the designerâs fee will be lowered on future projects.
Logo mills have an insidious impact on the perception among business owners regarding copyrights. By simply ignoring the existence of copyrights in the pricing structure, logo mills are completely devaluing copyrights. The result is a business community that increasingly is unaware of the existence or value of copyright and unwilling to pay what to them seems to be an unfair or unnecessary fee tacked on a job.
Also, even $100 for a logo (does that even include copyrights orâŠ?) is incredible low. If youâre curious how much a logo should go for:
Very small businesses (ie law firms, retail, etc.): $1,200-3,000 for a simple logo with all rights included
Minor corporation: $1,200-12,000
Major corporation: $4,000-25,000+
Obviously the price will also depend on the designerâs experience, copyright transfer, how fast the client needs the logo, revisions, tech specs for the logo, etc etc but you get the idea.Â
If youâre an artist or designer, donât go anywhere near companies that will treat you as a commodity. And if youâre a client, do some research on how much these types of things actually cost and what is involved in the cost. If you go to one of these companies for design services, you helping perpetuate these gross practices and further undervaluing art/design and copyright. Itâs why the Graphic Artists Guild and their handbook exists, as a resource for both artists and clients.