Ask HN: What should I be expecting to pay a designer?

[kmack]

Hey guys, I am just in the infant stages of a new start up and was hoping someone could give me some reference to work from in terms of hiring a designer. Currently, I am looking for someone to help come up with a logo and help with branding. Does anyone have any experience in this area?

Thanks

[scottmagdalein]

If it's just logo and branding, you can do it cheap at 99designs or do it expensive by hiring a single person with a reputation.

If you're going to hire a design employee, that's an entirely different discussion with lots and lots of variables.

[visualidiot → scottmagdalein]

Don't do it cheap at 99designs. That's the equivalent of writing your site in ASP.net: it looks like a good idea now, but soon, you'll regret it.

[manuscreationis → visualidiot]

I hate to hijack the comments with a response that doesn't address the OPs question at all, but I felt like that wasn't necessarily a fair comparison.

ASP.NET Webforms? Yes, huge mistake you'll regret

ASP.NET MVC? Fantastic choice, you will not regret it so long as you're a microsoft based shop

You can't make a blanket statement like that about ASP.NET, since it's effectively a bifurcated ecosystem at this point (and we're all hoping the WebForms fork dies a quick death).

[kmack → visualidiot]

That is what I was thinking. It seems like maybe just finding someone from a site like dribbble would be the thing to do. Invest in doing it right the first time.