Cost for webpage design?

I'm doing a web design project for a local company where I live, but don't have the first clue what a realistic price range to charge would be. All of the projects I've done before have been personal, done for free, or were done for companies I was already employed at.

Does anyone here do web design that could give some suggestions? Do I go for an hourly charge, do I charge per template, one set charge for the entire project, or something else? Obviously the price will partially be determined by how big of a deal it ends up being. Right now, it looks like I'll be doing two main designs, both probably a take-off of one main design idea - one for their main homepage, and one for their online store / catalog. I've no idea yet if I'll be doing any of the convertion of their website to the new template, or if I'll just be doing the main template and then handing it over to them to do the dirty work.

What kind of business is it? I do contract web work for a local music store and charge by the project (trust me, doing contract work is good assuming wherever you are is anything like Canada -- they won't deduct any taxes), and because I know that they don't really make a lot of money I really don't charge that much. Infact I have to stop in tonight and pick up $500 for a contract manager I wrote 'em. But if this company is rolling in the green and you're not only doing a main site for them but also a online shopping cart I'd go no lower than a grand. And god help you if you have to write a template for that fucking X-Cart, god do I never want to see Smarty templates again.

I've charged for a few brochure-style websites, and I've found that people like to know what it's going to cost up-front. If you're going to come up with an hourly charge, take that and multiply it by an estimated time of completion. I'd usually drop some off of the estimate too, just to keep them happy and more likely to come back to you for updates and future work.

I do line-item estimates for any freelance work I do. That way, your ass is covered- you and your client know exactly what is expected out of the project.

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Originally Posted by cka

What kind of business is it?

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It's a locally-owned office supply company. What I'm going to be doing, at least from what I know, is coming up with the new design and initial templates to give their site and online ordering system a more professional look. It'll all be graphic design and HTML / CSS work - no programming of any type. My only uncertainty is if they are going to want me to move all of their current content over into the new design, or if they'll do it themselves.

So, basically, I'm coming up with the new design, and then creating a few page templates for the different sections.

I get paid about 1k - 1.5k per HTML based webpage I do (freelance through a company)

Their firstborn child is the going rate in the industry, IIRC.

My wife charges $1000 for a 5 page site, plus cost of images (assuming the client is delivering the majority of the content). This is a competitive rate for small businesses here South Carolina. Larger clients would pay more, but she focuses on brochure style websites for SMBs. Up north, I can see the price being between $1800 and $2500 for 5 pages.

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Originally Posted by shidoshi

I'm doing a web design project for a local company where I live, but don't have the first clue what a realistic price range to charge would be. All of the projects I've done before have been personal, done for free, or were done for companies I was already employed at.

Does anyone here do web design that could give some suggestions? Do I go for an hourly charge, do I charge per template, one set charge for the entire project, or something else? Obviously the price will partially be determined by how big of a deal it ends up being. Right now, it looks like I'll be doing two main designs, both probably a take-off of one main design idea - one for their main homepage, and one for their online store / catalog. I've no idea yet if I'll be doing any of the convertion of their website to the new template, or if I'll just be doing the main template and then handing it over to them to do the dirty work.

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My friend owns his own web design company and no matter what he does he charges 20 dollars an hour. Maybe that will help you, hope it does. :)