How much should you charge for your work?

1 The first thing to do is work out what your motivations are for doing the job in the first place. Remove money as a factor, then consider through the communication that you’ve had with the client so far whether it’s a job that you want to take on and how it fits in with your longer-term goals.

2 Don’t be pressurised into giving someone a price until you know what it is that you’re pricing up. If you blurt something out after a 15-minute conversation, it’s not particularly professional and you can really shoot yourself in the foot. Just thinking on it overnight can stop you undervaluing yourself.

3 Consider the size of the company – whether it’s an individual just starting up or something larger. If your artwork is going to be the first point of contact that people have with a brand, then you need to take that into consideration with the fee.

4 With illustration and lettering you really have to understand where, how and for how long it’s being used. If you draw some type for £150 but then see it splashed across adverts and magazines, you’ve potentially lost thousands of pounds. Think of the whole project and consider the benefit of you providing that service.

1hundred is a screenprinted project that Tom Lane has been working on for almost two years – it’ll launch in autumn

1hundred is a screenprinted project that Tom Lane has been working on for almost two years – it’ll launch in autumn

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