The design world is constantly evolving. With technology, it’s on the fast track to becoming a commodity.
What is a commodity?
According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, a commodity is goods or a service whose wide availability typically leads to smaller profit margins and diminishes the importance of factors (such as brand name) other than price. It can also be interchangeable with another product of the same type. Coffee beans are a great example, there are many different brands yet they are all offering the same product.
Now, if we look objectively at the design it does not fit into this definition. Firstly, for the fact that quality alone changes so widely across markets. And secondly, the finished work differs drastically from one client to the next.
If you tasked ten different designers to create logos for your business, its nearly guaranteed that they won’t all meet your expectations. Reverse this and have ten individual clients create a brief for the same finished logo we would also have very different outcomes. With design, there are simply too many variables to call it a commodity.
The variables
There are many variables among designers. Each will bring varying degrees of creativity, expertise, skills, and experience to a job. For this reason, the prices differ from one designer to the next.
Choosing the cheapest option in the quoting process is where the issues begin. The problem is often people believe all designers are on the same level, making their designs a simple commodity. The idea that each will give them the same quality brochure, just how a $2 packet of coffee will give someone the same level of caffeine as an $8 tin. For design clients, this is unfortunately not the case. If they find themselves unimpressed with their brochure it isn’t interchangeable. Yet another thing that separates design from commodities.
Design is not interchangeable
The $2 packet of coffee can always be returned for a refund, or store credit to purchase the more expensive $8 tin. The untouched $2 packet of coffee can be added back to the shelf to be resold.
If a client is unimpressed with their brochure they can’t sell it on to make their money back. It is created to suit a unique brand. Design is not interchangeable. The designer can’t offer the same brochure to another person for the same reason. However, they could offer to change elements and reprint but that would cost them money.
Can we avoid commodification?
It is not that design is a commodity or becoming one, it is that people view it as a commodity. As designers, we strive to constantly improve ourselves to generate greater designs. To combat commodification, we use our skills and creativity to sell our work. If what we offer is worth every dollar then low prices shouldn’t need to be used as a selling point.
In the creative studio, we found the idea of design as a commodity a bit of a hot topic, something that needs to be discussed. As creative professionals, we are tackling the issue the best way we know how. By providing our clients with a service, not a product. We offer an experience, a personal approach to each project with the aim of adding value to our client’s brands.
