Free Pitching
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- Helvetica
This is a question for anybody out there who works for themselves or have setup their own company. How do you feel or do you have a policy for free pitching? We have got burned before and decided never to pitch for free again. some companies charge for hours put into the pitch, but are excluded from free pitching. What do you think makes it worthwhile, are there any conditions i.e. income that might affect your decision. Love your thoughts on this, Helv
- revolver0
You would not ask a builder to build you a wall for free so you could see if you liked the way he layed bricks.
Free pitching is evil, but a necessary evil in this day and age.
- gravityroom0
It all depends on how much goofing around the client is making you do. If its just coming up with the parameters of the project and a price - I'll do it for free.
BUT what you have to avoid is FCC or free creative counseling.
Creative thinking is one of my skills and therefore one of the things I don't give away.
- gravityroom0
I've made that mistake before and actually had clients steal the concept and get it done somewhere cheaper. Sorry folks meters running if that's the case.
- monoboy0
Oh yes, the old trick of getting you to pitch and then going with the cheapest agency with your concepts. (Without showing them, just steering them towards your ideas). It's often not worth the hassle and expense of court action. Been there.
If the design industry joined forces it could irradiated free pitching overnight. But work hungry agencies will always pitch for free.
I'm also sick of clients that tender a pich for an A3 poster with a run of 300 to ten different agencies. It's getting silly.
- dsmith70
My company actually has the client sign a pitch agreement that basically says that any concepts or ideas developed in the pitch process are sole ownership of our company and that they cannot go elsewhere with the idea or concepts we pitch to them. Do they anyways... yeah sometimes. Do we sue them...no. I believe the forms are in place for those rare occasions that your pitch might lead to something extremely lucrative and in that sense would be when the company would pursue litigation.
IMHO, I think free pitching is fine. I don't like asking a prospective client to sign an agreement before I even show him what I can do, but that is the rule at the company I am at now so I guess I have to live with it for now.
- nosaj0
I can't stand the idea of free pitching. The process I go through when designing something involves alot of input with the client, sketching and revision of mock-ups. There is no way I can go through this process for free... thus anything I make for a pitch isn't going to be completely suited for the client. I'd much rather show my portfolio, and discuss my process with clients, they should be able to get a truer feel for the quality of work they can expect.
Obvoiusly there are exceptions, I can see mocking up some idea's to show how you would handle a certain style of illustration or layout, if they had a specific look they had they were striving for.