When you are looking for any service, you shop around. I’m sure you have come across sites like “Fiverr” and Elance”. These sites promise great, authentic design and VERY low prices. But what are you really getting for $5?
I’ve followed the blog of Sacha Greif, as he attempts to show exactly what you do get if you decide to work with one of these companies. If you are interested in reading the full article, or Sacha’s blog, you can check it out here: https://blog.folyo.me/the-5-dollar-logo/ .
First, Sacha created a fake company. He came up with the name “SkyStats”, a service that provides analytics for travel sites. A logo for this company should be simple enough.
Sacha used Fiverr to find a design. He saw several designer profiles that looked promising but after looking closer, he discovered that almost EVERY SINGLE DESIGNER had logos in their portfolio that were stolen. This isn’t a good sign.
He decided to choose three designers to create a logo for him (after all – it’s only $5, right)? The first thing he noticed is that you don’t actually get a usable, workable logo for $5. If you want the copyright or source files of your own logo, you’ll have to pay more than that:
8 days later he received his first submission.
To start, the logo came with a grey background which would render the logo completely un-useable. He goes on to say “The first logo is definitely not very good. Leaving aside the dubious color choices (here’s a tip: unless you’re UPS, stay away from brownish colors for your logo) and weird gradients, the feeling just isn’t right. This feels more like the logo for a local airline’s in-flight magazine than a trendy, modern tech company.”
A day after that he receives the second submission:
He goes on to say ” Like the previous logo, this one features a black background that might look good, but makes extracting and reusing the logo much harder.
Speaking of extracting an image, the mark in the logo features obvious white artifacts that are probably an indication that it was (badly) lifted from somewhere else using a tool like Photoshop’s magic wand.
The plane graphic’s muddled curves are also a hint that it might have been automatically vectorized using a service such as VectorMagic, because it’s hard to imagine drawing a plane like this on purpose.”
After 14 days, he finally receives a logo from the third designer.
At first, this appears to be the best submission. But while doing some investigation, he finds out this logo is a DIRECT copy of another designers work:
So while paying $5 up front for a logo sounds appealing now, think of the long run. You will be losing money on terrible branding. Even worse, you run the risk of receiving stolen material and can be sued for much more.
When you work with a professional design company you are guaranteed professional, original work. You own the copyrights and, you receive all the files necessary to use and re-use your logo as many times as needed.