Meh, thanks for the reply. I have emailed binners. It is a paid job.

Luckily Binners is dirt cheap and takes Greggs gift vouchers! 🙂

Monkeysfeet – nobody is giving you stick directly. The discussion became about the wider issue of people being asked to do work for free.

I look forward to seeing what Binners creates for you.

Agree, i think in the entire discussion referenced maybe twice and it was just that the initial question went unanswered. No one gave you stick or anything of the sort. It was simply a discussion by a group of people who share a profession.

I look forward to seeing what Binners creates for you.

While you are waiting you can see what binners did for my launderette on his instagram

If you are offering your services for free it shows how much you value your skill or dont.

Another either/or fallacy. Sometimes we do it to offer someone in a/the community a leg-up. I don’t lower my quality, experience* or skills in order to do so, but it may just take a couple of weeks to deliver instead of a couple of days were it a different client/situation.

In my case as it is I’m early ‘retired‘ on account of it falling to me to be a de-facto full-time carer for a spouse with now compound disabilities/round-the-clock needs. I no longer have the hours in a day or night to offer my professional skills full time, but I do sometimes have the hours over a week/at night to offer family, friends and community members some help. I also *receive* help at times. None of which is any reflection of my (nor anyone’s) objective, or subjective assessment of (award-winning) design skills/35 years experience. It just is what it is.

While it’s no doubt true that some people might offer to do things for free/for favours or at reduced rates because they ‘don’t value their skills’, It’s wholly fallacious to apply that assumption to all situations. Harumph!

Do you need any pie charts?

Under-appreciated contribution.

as one of the key moaners to be fair its one of my biggest issues i have with the design industry people just dont see the value in it due to all the bedroom designers.

the problem is, there’s no real reason why a “bedroom designer” with enough talent CAN’T churn out something just as good as a “proper” designer, with a fraction of the overheads. Everyone has access to the same professional tools cheaply now. I guess it’s only going to get worse too, with potential clients outsourcing design work to countries like India, and other designers made redundant in the wake of Covid turning “bedroom designer” themselves in order to get a bit of money coming in.

Everyone has access to the same professional tools

I can buy a trowel but I couldn’t build a house.

That’s because you’re a ham-fisted oaf 😂 I bet someone out there who isn’t a professional builder has done it though, and made a decent job of it.

I had a designer approach me asking to design a logo for me to he could build his portfolio. He did a cracking job of it so the least I can do on.a regular basis is give him some credit. And the fact it’s been copied by other brands suggests its quitw good i think.

Greg Trowman at The Black Eye project if anyone’s interested.

Under-appreciated contribution.
😀

the problem is, there’s no real reason why a “bedroom designer” with enough talent CAN’T churn out something just as good as a “proper” designer, with a fraction of the overheads. Everyone has access to the same professional tools cheaply now. I

I never said a bedroom designer couldn’t produce quality work i just think offering work for free devalues what we do and thats something I stand by. Just look at music no one values it any more the idea of paying for a single album is madness for most. Another way of looking at it is does working for free actually exclude people. Only a select group of people will be able to work for free, basically those who are fortunate enough (could say privileged) to have financial support to do it for free. For example I had to turn down a placement at M&C Saatchi when I graduated because it wasn’t paid while other more fortunate uni friends were able to take up unpaid interns at places like W&K and BBH. I feel like its not complicated do some work for someone and they pay some how either an exchange of services, money, or even stock options

Another way of looking at it is does working for free actually exclude people.

I think your platform is tipping over at this point with the weight of the extra strawmen.

As a case in point I’ve only ever offered ‘free/voluntary contribution’ logo-work a couple of times (ie two) in 35 years. I’m not losing sleep over it* It helped a couple of people out. One was an animal sanctuary and not-for profit, and one was an STWr who was being made redundant. I also know what being made ‘redundant‘ feels like (not by an employer, I had to quit my career because of a situation beyond my control/was needed elsewhere)

So no, I’ve not made anyone redundant, and I’m not aware of any graphic designers offering to work for free except (as per example) for the very occasional good-will offer (on own time and own dime)

If some pro bike mechanic happens to chance by you and tricky MTB breakdown on the trail – and offers to help you out? You going to berate them for dealing their trade a ‘blow’?

* actually not true – insomniac ‘night shift’ shenanigans! Computers are a blessing and a curse. Remember when it was all Cow gum, scalpels, Rotring and angle-lamps?

the problem is, there’s no real reason why a “bedroom designer” with enough talent CAN’T churn out something just as good as a “proper” designer, with a fraction of the overheads.

Have we discussed how low some ‘Clients’ standards are yet?
They really believe their nieces ‘design’ in Word is epic.

I think your platform is tipping over at this point with the weight of the extra strawmen

Really good of you to just totally disregard a personal experience and one that’s repeated throughout our industry. Just look at the lack of diversity in this industry but that’s another topic.

And as already covered doing work for a charity or not for profit is a lot different than doing something for a start up who will likely make money off a designers work. If you design a t-shirt for someone and they profit off your work  by selling said t-shirtwhy shouldn’t you be compensated?

I have also done free work in the past for a fair few charities which I feel is reasonable thing to do.

We need to educate clients and make them understand why a logo costs a lot of money rather than bending and being yeh sure i will do it for free. If you are offering your services for free it shows how much you value your skill or dont.

I was in no way suggesting that you (or anyone) work for free. Rather, if there’s a market for cheap shit design then you can whine about that, or you can capitalise on it and then potentially upsell (you don’t want that, you want this because this is why it’s better). Why do you think Seat / Skoda / VW / Audi are all different marques when they’re all selling ostensibly the same products? You could put your name to the good stuff and disassociate yourself from the churn, no? Take on a trainee even, if there’s sufficient market demand.

I’m in mind of tattoo artists here. Every good tattooist will have a portfolio of their bespoke work as examples to encourage commissions, but most parlours will still have folders and posters up in reception of ‘flash,’ standard crap that they can sell day-to-day to teenagers who want pattern 37B traced onto their ankle.

Coming back to this as I just offered to do a quick bit of leaflet artwork for free for a friend who runs a local church group.

She asked me on Tuesday night and I spent yesterday chasing her for the things I needed (ie, NOT .ppt files) which she finally sent to me an hour ago with the parting shot…

When do you think you will be able to return it to me? Sorry for being cheeky – I need to get it printed. Thanks again

FFS, I feel like telling her to do one now.

Sounds typical! 🙂

I have a policy of never doing print or design work for friends now, either commercial or charity related. It always goes tits-up at some stage.

I try not to make friends of existing customers either – but I’m a grumpy arse so that’s not hard!

I don’t do “mates rates”.
Its either free or charged fully. In return I don’t ask them for cheap deals. Seems to work out.

@johndoh haha typical 😃 I had a friend of my dad’s once wanted me to do some artwork for some banners for a charity he’s involved with. I was happy to do the artwork for free as I was going to charge him to print them. Came back to me and said that he was going to get them printed online as it was cheaper, only could I still do the artwork for free as the online place don’t do artwork? NO. THAT IS WHY THEY ARE CHEAPER 🤣🤣🤣

I don’t do “mates rates”.
Its either free or charged fully. In return I don’t ask them for cheap deals. Seems to work out.

I actually do loads of deals with other local people & businesses. Love a swap/barter! Helps make contacts and can be a bit of fun. Things I’ve got in swaps lately: wetsuit, big bag of oak offcuts, rack of locally-farmed pork ribs, weeks worth of bacon sandwiches from cafe, one-off ceramic sculpture, window cleaning, van service, house move 😃

Yep, I’ve traded photos/design for stuff. But only small scale stuff. My instamodel mate asked me to do flyers for her beauty business and wanted to pay me in product…

My instamodel mate asked me to do flyers for her beauty business and wanted to pay me in product…

That can’t be left hanging 🙂

When do you think you will be able to return it to me? Sorry for being cheeky – I need to get it printed. Thanks again
FFS, I feel like telling her to do one now.

Why is asking when it will done a problem? Surely that is a pretty reasonable question even if it is a favour.

I’m assuming from the context the printer’s deadline was yesterday.

Why is asking when it will done a problem? Surely that is a pretty reasonable question even if it is a favour.

I’m assuming from the context the printer’s deadline was yesterday.

Exactly. I am happy to help but she suddenly threw a deadline in as well (which I had no idea about). I ended up working late last night to do it.

In particular it was the wording I need to get it printed. that pissed me off. Had she said something like ‘I know it’s a bit last minute but I’d really appreciate it if you could do it as soon as possible because the printer has a slot to be able to get it printed for me tomorrow’

Now she has asked if I can do some Facebook headers and artwork for a big printed banner too.

FFS – I am 53, I should have learned before now to never do favours.

Is she called Louise? 🙂

Is she called Louise?

No, because I have never had (nor desire to have) sexual relations with her. All Louise’s are mad ex partners. My ex-Louise was quite mad.