Pricing a portfolio

A portfolio is the worst project to lose money on, and yet it’s where most money gets lost. The brief is accepted with a discount “for exposure”, phases stretch unbilled, and the work ships as if it were a free piece for the studio’s own reel.

Charge for what you already know how to do

A portfolio is not an experimental project. It is exactly the kind of brief you’ve been running for years: structure, content, system, deployment. If you usually charge X for a similar corporate site, there’s no reason to charge less for a site whose client has a face and a voice.

Phases you always bill

1. Strategy and content. Before touching Figma, there are decisions about what to show and how. It’s measurable work.
2. Base system. Layout, typography, palette, behaviours. The investment that amortises over every future page.
3. Implementation. Astro/Next/whatever, CMS integration, deployment.
4. Maintenance or handover. Documentation, short CMS training, support defined in hours or months.

If one of those four phases is given away, the other three get infected.

Common traps

• “We’ll adjust the portfolio bit at the end.” No. It’s billed like any other project, with a deposit and named deliverables.
• “Let’s try and see.” A concrete exploratory quote — even small — separates work from a favour.
• Infinite iterations. Three rounds of feedback are included. The fourth is additional work, with its own line in the quote.

What can legitimately be different

If the client is a small studio or an author with a tight budget, an honest, named discount is fine. But honest and named: the quote shows the standard price, the applied discount and the reason. That protects both the design and the person paying for it.