How much will your branding cost?
Pick your scope and get an illustrative range, with the entire model published underneath so you can check every figure that produced it.
There is no single price for branding in Australia, because the phrase covers everything from a logo and its variations to a full identity system with strategy and written guidelines behind it. This calculator turns your actual scope into an illustrative range in about 30 seconds, using 10 published deliverable figures and 3 adjustment factors you can read in full further down this page. It is a planning tool, not a quote.
How this calculator works
The whole model is 4 steps of arithmetic, and it is published here so nothing about the number you see is hidden behind a script:
- Add the planning figure for every deliverable you tick. That total is the base.
- Multiply the base by the project-type factor: 1 for a new brand, 0.7 for a refresh.
- Multiply by the business-size factor, which runs from 0.75 for a sole trader to 2.5 for a business over 50 staff.
- Round to the nearest $100. That is the low end. Multiply the low end by 2.2 for the high end.
Nothing is randomised, nothing changes between visits, and the widget above calls exactly the figures in the tables below. If a number in a table changes, the calculator and the worked examples change with it.
The 10 deliverable figures
Each row is what that deliverable contributes to the base before any factor is applied. The second column is the part most cost conversations skip: what you are actually buying.
| Deliverable | Base figure | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Logo and core variations | $1,500 | A primary logo plus the versions you actually need day to day: horizontal, stacked, a standalone mark, single-colour and reversed, and the file formats a printer and a website both accept. |
| Full brand identity system | $2,500 | The system around the logo: colour palette, type hierarchy, layout rules, graphic devices and the decisions that make 2 unrelated pieces of collateral look like the same business. |
| Brand guidelines document | $800 | The written rules that let someone who was not in the room apply the brand correctly. Logo clear space, minimum sizes, colour values in every format, type hierarchy, and what not to do. |
| Brand strategy and positioning | $1,500 | The work before the drawing: who the customer is, what the business is claiming, how it differs from the obvious alternatives, and the language that carries it. Adds discovery sessions and research time. |
| Stationery (business card, letterhead) | $500 | Business card, letterhead, email signature and the print-ready artwork. Design only. Printing is a separate cost paid to a printer. |
| Social media templates | $600 | Profile and cover artwork plus editable post templates sized for the platforms the business actually uses, so posts stay on-brand without a designer in the loop each time. |
| Website design (visual only) | $3,000 | Page designs, not a built website. Adds the largest single jump to a range because it is a separate discipline with its own review cycle. Development and hosting are quoted separately. |
| Packaging design | $2,000 | Artwork set up to a physical dieline, with the compliance panels, barcodes and print specifications the manufacturer requires. Print production is separate. |
| Signage design | $800 | Artwork and specifications for a fascia, window graphics or a site sign, supplied at the scale a fabricator needs. Fabrication and installation are separate trades and separate quotes. |
| Vehicle signage | $700 | Artwork laid out to the panel shape of a specific vehicle. A ute and a van are 2 layouts, not 1. Wrapping and application are paid to the installer. |
The 3 adjustment factors
Project type
| Project type | Factor | Reasoning |
|---|---|---|
| New brand | 1 | Nothing to carry forward, so every decision is made from a blank page. |
| Brand refresh | 0.7 | An existing brand supplies constraints and reference material, which removes some of the exploration a new brand needs. It does not remove the rollout. |
A brand refresh is discounted in this model because the existing brand supplies constraints. It is not discounted because it is a smaller job. Rollout is often the larger half of a refresh, and this calculator does not attempt to price rollout at all.
Business size
| Business size | Factor | Reasoning |
|---|---|---|
| Sole trader | 0.75 | There is 1 decision maker, few applications and a short approval loop. Less work reaches the same finished result. |
| Small business (1 to 10 staff) | 1 | The reference point. Every other factor on this page is expressed relative to this one. |
| Medium business (10 to 50 staff) | 1.5 | More people to consult, more places the brand has to work, and rules that have to survive being handed to staff. |
| Larger business (50+ staff) | 2.5 | Multiple stakeholders, sub-brands, procurement and legal review, and a rollout that has to be documented rather than explained. |
The spread
The high end of every range on this page is the low end multiplied by 2.2. That single figure stands in for everything the model cannot see: how many concepts get explored, how much research happens before anyone opens a drawing tool, how many revision rounds are included, and whether you are handed a folder of finished files or a single flattened image. It is an assumption about how wide the gap between a lean quote and a thorough one usually is. It is not a measured distribution, and a real quote can sit outside it in either direction.
3 worked examples
Each example below is computed by the same function the calculator calls, so the arithmetic is reproducible from the tables above.
Sole trader, logo only
A new trades business needs a logo it can put on a ute, a shirt and an invoice. No strategy work, no website, no guidelines document.
- Deliverables
- Logo and core variations, Vehicle signage
- Base before factors
- $2,200
- Illustrative range
- $1,700 to $3,600
The smallest sensible scope on this calculator. If a quote lands well under the low end, ask what is being skipped: usually it is the file formats, the one-colour version, or any exploration at all.
Small business, full identity
A 6-person cafe group opening a second site. New logo, the identity system around it, a guidelines document so staff and suppliers stay consistent, plus stationery and social templates.
- Deliverables
- Logo and core variations, Full brand identity system, Brand guidelines document, Stationery (business card, letterhead), Social media templates
- Base before factors
- $5,900
- Illustrative range
- $5,900 to $13,000
The most common shape of enquiry this site receives. The guidelines document is the part most people drop to save money and the part they most often come back for.
Medium business, refresh
A 30-person firm keeping its name and equity but modernising the identity: refreshed logo, rebuilt identity system, new guidelines, and page designs for a website rebuild.
- Deliverables
- Logo and core variations, Full brand identity system, Brand guidelines document, Brand strategy and positioning, Website design (visual only)
- Base before factors
- $9,300
- Illustrative range
- $9,800 to $21,500
The refresh factor takes 30% off the exploration, then the size factor puts more back on for stakeholder time and rollout. A refresh at this size is rarely cheaper than a new brand at a smaller one.
Where these figures come from, and where they do not
They are our own planning assumptions. There is no pricing survey, no dataset and no industry benchmark behind them, and we are not going to dress them up as one. Nothing on this page should be read as a statement of what Australian designers charge.
What the model is genuinely useful for is structure. It shows you which parts of a scope carry the weight, what a refresh actually changes, and why 2 businesses asking for “a logo” can receive quotes that are nowhere near each other. Treat the output as a sanity check on a quote you have been given, not as the price you should expect to pay. If we ever replace these figures with real data, the source, the publisher and the year will be printed on this page next to them.
What actually moves the number on a real quote
There are 6 things that move a real quote far more than the tick boxes above, and none of them are visible in a calculator:
- How much thinking happens first. A project that starts with brand strategycosts more up front and produces far fewer rounds of “can we see another version?” later.
- How many concepts you are shown.A single considered direction and 5 speculative ones are different amounts of work, and both get described as “concepts”.
- Revision rounds. Ask how many are included and what happens on the one after that. This is where a cheap quote quietly becomes an expensive one.
- What you are handed at the end. A full file set for a logo design project means vector source files, single-colour and reversed versions, and formats a printer will accept without asking questions.
- Whether the rules are written down. Brand guidelines are the most commonly cut item and the most commonly repurchased one, because without them consistency depends on whoever happens to be making the artwork.
- How much ongoing collateral follows. Menus, brochures, signage artwork and social assets are graphic design work, priced separately from the identity that governs them.
What is never included in these figures
Every number on this page is for design work: the thinking, the artwork and the files. Physical and technical production is separate, and it is paid to a different business:
- Printing stationery, menus, brochures and packaging, paid to a printer.
- Fabricating and installing signage, paid to a sign fabricator.
- Wrapping or applying vehicle graphics, paid to an installer.
- Building and hosting a website from approved page designs, paid to a developer.
- Trade mark searches and registration, handled by an attorney or through IP Australia.
Keeping those quotes separate is the single easiest way to see what your branding is really costing you. When you are ready for a real number, the quote form takes about 2 minutes, and our process page explains exactly what happens to the brief after you send it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Ready for a real quote?
A tool gives you a starting range. A quote comes from a designer reading your actual brief. Send us the brief and we will pass it to an experienced Australian brand design studio. We aim to respond within 1 business day.