Preamble

Copryce is designed for designers but can also be useful to clients, consultants, lawyers, schools, local authorities, administrations, etc. Moneydesign works in partnership with professional design organizations. We believe it is essential to also educate their clients who wish to establish their budgets within a fair framework, enabling true partnership that guarantees quality and shared success.

"How much does graphic design for a website cost, product design, space conception?" "How do you write a design quote?" "How do you calculate creative fees?" "How do you calculate copyright or usage rights?" It is to answer these questions that the Moneydesign association developed this site.

Establishing the price of an intellectual and artistic service may seem more complex than selling material goods. We often imagine that an idea is the result of a "gift" and that creating is simple and quick. However, designers mobilize skills acquired during higher education and through professional experience.

As in any profession, creation, however spontaneous it may be, always results from a comprehensive process that is often long and costly, which can be quantified with objective data related to any economic activity.

A concept now widely misunderstood: copyright. It is often perceived as "superfluous." Yet it is the law: within the legal framework of design, intellectual property, whether commissioned work or not, cannot be reproduced without the written agreement of its author.

"Why pay rights when we have already paid to create the work?" Because it is put to commercial use, whether in two dimensions (printed materials, digital media...) or three dimensions (spaces and objects...), visual, audio, audiovisual, tactile... A design work provides a service each time it is seen, read, heard, explored, touched, experienced... It transmits the client's message to the targeted audience. It is this added value that copyright compensates.

Low compensation for this service, or even its gratuity, is conceivable, particularly for projects intended for humanitarian organizations. This assessment and choice belong to the designer.

Fees are free, as is the calculation of copyright. What is free is negotiated. Precise specifications, established according to the specificity of each project, unique by nature, should allow the user to assess the fair value of a price.

The fee price ranges correspond to activity for common projects of independent workers and design SMEs participating in our surveys. The examples in this guide reflect economically and commercially viable practices for professional activity. Costs are indicative and do not limit free competition, as users are not required to respect the amounts estimated by this guide.

Consequently, our surveys do not include:

• amateur deadlines and prices;
• unfair and prohibited commercial practices (dumping), such as proposing a price below the profitability of professional activity;
• additional fees that renowned designers might charge;
• certain specific markets, such as luxury, for which we lack data to establish reliable amounts.

Copryce relies on proportional rights to distribution to display a rights transfer amount. Its ease of use seeks a balance between market law, competition, economic conditions... and ethics, economic viability, quality and professional skills.

Given the stakes or economic reality of certain design projects, particularly those intended for publishing and/or sale, or the luxury market, the flat-rate rights amount displayed by Copryce may seem inappropriate (excessive or insufficient). It then becomes advantageous for the designer and client to establish a royalty contract: a fee calculated on the revenue generated from model sales. The client thus spreads the payment of rights according to the rhythm of actual use.

Royalty contracts, necessarily established case by case, fall under the competence of lawyers specializing in intellectual property. Professional organizations can provide information on this subject.