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How do I price a custom font?

Tré SealsTré Seals Posts: 7
edited May 2019 in Type Business
Hi all! I'm Tré Seals, and I run a font foundry called Vocal Type Co. I've only been doing this for 2 years, and I just got my first request for a custom font.

This client wants a custom version of one of my commercially available fonts (soft corners and modified proportions). The license would cover everything (desktop, web, app, ePub, merchandising, broadcasting) with 1-year exclusivity and 200 users.

I've never done anything like this before and was wondering if anyone has any recommendations on how to go about this.

P.S., this is my first post, so apologies if it's in the wrong place.
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    Scott BriggsScott Briggs Posts: 14
    @JoyceKetterer is bang on.
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    Tré SealsTré Seals Posts: 7
    @JoyceKetterer @Scott Briggs  @Nick Shinn @Thomas Phinney

    Thank you so much for the help everyone!! I really appreciate it.

    On a similar note, does anyone have recommendations on how to scale prices? Or how/if the prices should vary between licenses?
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    Artur SchmalArtur Schmal Posts: 74
    Do you mean if there  difference between retail or custom licenses?
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    Thomas PhinneyThomas Phinney Posts: 2,748
    Scale as in, depending on the number of users?
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    Tré SealsTré Seals Posts: 7
    @Artur Schmal @Thomas Phinney

    I mean what kind of price difference should there be (if any at all) between desktop, web, app, ePub, and broadcasting licenses? For example, how House Industries charges more for a webfont license than a desktop license.

    And then how would I go about scaling the price for these different licenses based on the number of users (desktop), page views per month (web), active users (app), etc.?
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    Jasper de WaardJasper de Waard Posts: 617
    edited May 2019
    You might have found these already, but I found these old threads incredibly helpful when I was in a similar situation as you are now:

    - https://typedrawers.com/discussion/167/price-quotation-for-a-new-custom-font/p1
    - https://typedrawers.com/discussion/1098/custom-font-design-pricing
    - http://typedrawers.com/discussion/733/unlimited-licensing/p1

    Edit: Great work btw! Vocal Type is one of those concepts you wish you would have thought of yourself ;)
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    Claudio PiccininiClaudio Piccinini Posts: 677
    Tré Seals said:
    P.S., this is my first post, so apologies if it's in the wrong place.
    Unrelated but congratulations on the site, it’s beautiful how you present these typefaces. I also share the cultural approach for which type stems not merely from a concept or out of an intended use, but creates historical awareness.
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    Hrant Հրանդ Փափազեան PapazianHrant Հրանդ Փափազեան Papazian Posts: 2,044
    edited May 2019
    Nice going!

    One big thing to factor in is that the exclusivity period is unusually short... In fact I would try to sell them on a longer period.
    Claudio Piccinini
    I also share the cultural approach for which type stems not merely from a concept or out of an intended use, but creates historical awareness.
    But users are generally not buying your good intentions, so a font can have a great story but still end up like it could have the opposite story... It's what people do with it that counts, and that comes essentially from how it looks.

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    Claudio PiccininiClaudio Piccinini Posts: 677
    Hrant H. Papazian said:
    But users are generally not buying your good intentions, so a font can have a great story but still end up like it could have the opposite story... It's what people do with it that counts, and that comes essentially from how it looks.

    I was not talking about good intentions, rather of approach.
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    Claudio PiccininiClaudio Piccinini Posts: 677
    And yes, that article was naive and showing a superficial approach (see Twitter).
    Sad to see such a moralistic attitude towards designers. :-(
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    Tré SealsTré Seals Posts: 7
    Thank you very much for the kind words and the help @Jasper de Waard @Claudio Piccinini @Hrant H. Papazian .
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    Claudio PiccininiClaudio Piccinini Posts: 677
    Tré Seals said:
    Thank you very much for the kind words and the help @Jasper de Waard @Claudio Piccinini @Hrant H. Papazian .
    They’re deserved. It would be awesome if in the future you’d be able to enrich the research aspects beyond social equity issues and towards culture and history of thought in general. I find extremely fascinating when typefaces are produced for, and incarnate in relevant cultural and historical events.
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