Similarly, graphic designers. It's becoming more common for businesses to accept portfolio pieces in lieu of money so the demands that we be paid are unreasonable.
I will say that the design industry is 10x better than the film industry. While you're starting out in design, clients will ask you to work for free. But just say no and move to the next one. Luckily, there aren't a lot of other designers telling you to work for free. Most forums are filled with advice on how not to work for free (or too cheap) . The film industry - exact opposite. Music? Same shit. Go sit somewhere, run around, drive a cube truck, for 14 hour days, for 5 days straight, for nothing. I thought it was just film school days / NYC. It's worse here in LA. I've got at least 6 24-30 year old friends from film school who all still take free work, and not free directing work or free work for their best friend. Random dude calls them up and asks and they say okay hoping it'll lead them somewhere better next week. It won't. Never work for free. People will respect you more when your prices are twice what you think they ought to be.
Preach! I've recently had a spate of one-off gigs doing home improvement and maintenance for rich people. At first, I undersold myself. I had been doing this work for the last several years in one form or another, but only on a volunteer basis -- in AmeriCorps, or for my family-- so it was very difficult to gauge what I ought to charge for my time. I found that when I charged a minimal amount, the clients were more entitled and demanding (frequent requests to drop everything and come over; getting haggled down; etc.). But because I was consistent and punctual and worked hard, I would always get follow-up work and referrals. It got to be that I was stretching myself thin from all demands on my time. So for the next client, I practically doubled my rate. Half-exasperatedly, I figured she would look elsewhere. She didn't blink, hired me on the spot, and it's been that much more lucrative since. Granted my n is like 6 people. But I intuit that when you charge a higher rate, the client simply respects you more. This stuff has been incredibly fascinating to me. I've recently had thoughts about starting a business doing this sort of thing. I just wish that my marketable skills didn't have such historically low ceilings (property management, basic home improvement).People will respect you more when your prices are twice what you think they ought to be.
I've experienced the exact same thing time and time again. I get busy, I throw some huge number out there, they accept immediately, PayPal me within hours, and are the best client. WTF. I recently had a few clients need rush / weekend work completed too. So I doubled my hourly (they're long-term clients, not one-offs) and guess what. They accepted.
I can also attest to blackbootz and insomniasexx's experiences. I was recently approached to do a piece of work that was very much outside of my comfort zone and a rush weekend job. As such, I just went in with a crazy high price. In the grand scheme of things it wasn't that much, but I don't exactly have a massive portfolio and it was more than two times what I'd charged previously. They accepted. Unfortunately, I think that particular project has gone south despite me delivering something that I think was pretty good for the time and terrible brief they gave me. At least I got paid I guess, but I feel a bit bad about it. It was mostly poor communication from their end, but in hindsight I should have pressed to get the information I needed. The lesson I learned: Always make sure to get a robust brief from the client. Don't let them be vague because you will end up failing to meeting expectations you didn't know they had. It sounds simple now, but I suppose the obvious things are the easiest to slip by in the beginning.
I disagree. Peope who just started their creative work should definitely work for less or nothing if there's a reasonable chance they get their foor in the door. Working for cheap / less is the biggest advantage (in some fields, the only advantage) they have over established professionals. Once you get enough demand for whatever service you provide that you run out of time, that's when you can ramp up the prices. But until that moment I see no reason to work for less or for free. I'm not saying people should accept being exploited for months, but in fields where everyone wants to get into you just won't get enough work if you never work for less. Respect doesn't pay the bills.Never work for free. People will respect you more when your prices are twice what you think they ought to be.
This is the thing. If someone has the ability and will to pay for creative work, then they can (and will) from day one. I've yet to find a client that respects the creative work who is willing to pay too little or not at all. The people who don't pay aren't worth anyones time, and are going to expect the world from you. There are couple of exceptions to this rule: - A school or fresh-out-of-school internship program at a big-time company. A lot of my friends worked for The Daily Show in NY for 2 nights a week for 6 weeks. This gave them school credit, helped them make connections, and showed them what working on a real live set was like. However, I don't see why The Daily Show couldn't pay these interns as well. Even at $15.00/hour, that's pocket change. It's just because they can pay people nothing, so they do. FYI, none of them now work for The Daily Show. This is much different than a 30 year old making a documentary with "no budget" and not paying the crew. The likelihood that you are (1) going to meet someone valuable on set (2) work with the guy again when he's rich and famous or (3) get any experience that you wouldn't have gotten out of your student projects is slim to none. In a career sense, paying someone $15/hour isn't that much. If you are attempting to do a trial run with someone, you should have them work 1 or 2 days (8-16 hours) per week. You should be able to determine if they are a worthwhile addition to your team in a month, or maximum 8 days. 64$15=$960. That's nothing in the grand scheme of a business. Thats like half of the CEO's desk chair. That's less than their monthly electricity bill. In a freelance / contract sense, if you are committed to having a new website, a new marketing campaign, a couple new homepage banners, then you should pay for it. If you get it for free, you aren't ready to commit to that decision. Whenever you aren't paying for someone's time, there is no reason for you to do your job properly the first time around. For example, when I was just starting out, I agreed to design a menu for a friend of a friend for free. They gave me the PDF of their old menu, said they needed these new menu items and explained what they hated about the menu and sent me on my way. I redesigned it and, even looking at it 5 years later, it wasn't half bad. But you know what happened? The client took 2 weeks to respond to me and then sent me a Word Document with the actual new menu / menu item breakdowns. So I re-did the whole thing, essentially from scratch. If this was a real client of mine, that would have been a change order and I would have re-quoted for the changes due to lack of organization on their part. For that reason, I rarely have big things like that change today and if they do change, they pay. This makes clients get their shit together before* handing shit off to me...usually. I'll say this again and again, but the people who are willing to pay upfront are the best clients. They know what they want, they know it costs money to get it, and they are willing to make money not an issue so that you can be creative and do your job. The ones who negotiate incessantly, who don't want to pay, who take 3 weeks to get you a check will always make your life more difficult and the money will not be worth it.
There's two points here that I think are somewhat conflated in this discussion, which is kinda my fault: 1) asking more for your creative work earns you more respect with your clients 2) asking less when you start your creative job is a good / bad thing The article and your comments are mostly about 1), and I tried to steer the conversation to 2). 1) is something I agree on completely - you clearly are getting a lot more respect from clients by asking a substantial sum and I think that the whole 'just do it for exposureee!' problem stems from a lack of respect. What I am trying to argue is that even though respect comes with asking more than you think you are worth, I still think that for a lot of new creative professionals it is a good thing to start out by asking less or sometimes nothing. I disagree with the 'never' in your 'Never work for free'. Do you think you would have gotten where you are today if you hadn't done those cheap gigs earlier on? I think that to build a network, to become really skillful not just in your creative work but also in all the bullshit around it, you need to work on a lot of gigs. Nobody's gonna re-hire someone who asked too much for half-bad work, like with your menu for a friend.