buzz07

I've been working on a logo + website project for a startup client. When I presented the logo proposals to her the first time, she picked her choice and was quite enthusiastic about it. After a couple of days, she came back to me saying that I have to come up with a new series of proposals. She had shown her choice to people she knew and one of them had a bad reaction to it. I explained her, as diplomatic as I could, that this was all well and good but that I would have to charge her extra if she required me to start from scratch. She reacted badly to this. In the end, I did the new set of proposals without asking her for any additional cost.

A final logo design was chosen, which I fine tuned further. Then I started work on the website, which again she approved, before it was handed over to a developer. Everything seemed to be going smoothly. Then all of a sudden I get a call from her saying that she'd like us to restart everything. She said that she had "matured" over the last few weeks this project has been running (she's already in her forties so perhaps she meant her ideas had matured!) and she now realizes that she had been going in the wrong direction. Now she knows exactly what she wants. When I mentioned the cost, she agreed that there might be extra charges but that these should be kept to a minimum.

To top it all off, she now wants to sit next to me and work together on the new concept. It seems that she has a very specific idea of how the logo and website should look like and she wants to use me as her hands.

My inclination is to just walk away - even if I had to pay back the 50% down payment (although up until her matrix moment, the project was about 90% complete and I had worked the corresponding hours - and that's not including the earlier volte face). Who's to say she won't flip-flop again?

However, I'm hesitating for the following reason.

I built-up a good reputation working in agencies (including working for some difficult/demanding clients) before recently deciding to become an independent designer. My client base is small and everyone seems to know everyone else - especially through an active online professional community that both I and this client are members of. There is therefore a significant risk that she might bad mouth me to existing or potential clients.

I don't want to lose my good name after working so hard to get one.

Any tips on the best way to handle this situation?

Thanks

cbowman

I feel you get a good reputation by being honest and professional with your customers. My first suggestion with this customer is patience, you will find that there are alot of customers out there like this, generally what happens is the first job you get could be a pain in the butt, but what seems to happen after that first job is you build a really good relationship with that customer and any new jobs you get will go easier. To deal with this situation i would sit down with the customer and explain where you are at with the cost, use real numbers and give her the cost of redoing the entire project. Give her suggestions as to how to cut the cost down for her or comeup with alternative solutions with the problem. If she still wants to go foreward just give her a real cost on the job. Good luck be honest with your customers and you will never have to worry about your reputation professionalism gets around much more than a crazy disgruntled person does, also people respect you more if you have to turn down work or tell a customer you can't help them.

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Curtis Bowman
Graphic Designer & Print Specialist
www.cbowman.net

buzz07

Thanks for your advice.
Patience is definitely what I need!

alyCe

Ask her, if she had hired a group of carpenters and architects and plumers and etc to build her a new house, and when they were almost finnished with it you decided that you wanted the house square instead of rectangular. Would she ask them to tear it down and build a new one for free? You are working there as a professional, and should be paid for the work you do.

However, you are there as a graphic designer (yes?). She is still in charge of the concept and has the full right of playing AD on you (sadly).

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Gino

When you do a logo design project you must be extremely clear. Say you will get 3 initial concepts and up to 3 revision rounds. Anything after that will cost extra, this way the client is much more careful planning and you wont get into a bad situation, make sure u at least have them agree tot his in an email.

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alyCe

Do you have a contract? Does it say anything about this?

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everyone runs, nobody hides

buzz07

Thanks for your replies. I didn't mention the maximum number of concepts to be presented on my contract up until now - stupid me! I learnt my lesson. I just hope I'll get to the end of the tunnel without losing my temper. She's just sent me a sketch with how the logo and website should look. Sometimes, you can get great ideas from your client and I do believe in working in collaboration with them. However, in this case, I really don't see what she is going for.