I'm accustomed to extended licensing being handled on a client by client and usage basis. I was approached by a firm that would like to secure licensing for all extended usage outside of standard desktop licensing (web, broadcast, embedding, etc.) for an unlimited duration for unlimited clients (for a limited number of users, they didn't specify the amount of styles they want to use).
I've never heard of a scenario such as this, it seems unrealistic. Does anyone have experience with this where a design firm would secure unlimited licensing use for a font for all their clients. I'm used to pricing out extended licensing case by case, based on usage, for single clients.
Any advice?
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If you price out a 'buy out' of unlimited usage for a single style for one client it can get really costly. To amplify that for multiple styles, unlimited clients, unlimited duration for uses that are priced by duration it just seems excessive.
It kind of justifies why things are calculated per style, per client as how do you put a realistic price on such an 'unlimited' licensing scenario?
I make sure the agreement is non exclusive and the font is renamed. I add something to the copyright section that indicates that it's only for use by Blablah Corporation. If it gets out in the wild at least I'll know where it came from. So far, I've never seen one.
I usually add a clause that prevents them from selling the font directly. Then I charge roughly the price of a new car.
Renaming the font is sometimes a new name, sometimes the corporation's name tacked onto the end. I've had clients who wanted a full buyout but I've always managed to talk them into non-exclusive.
Someone has reached out on behalf of a company who would like a quote for a worldwide, unlimited, all-inclusive license of two styles from one of my already existing fonts. They are not asking for exclusivity.
In essence, it's a "brand" license where the company will have the two fonts as a brand asset to use and provide to all of their employees and all current and future affiliates and partners to the brand (agencies, printers, businesses that sell the brands product and are creating their own in-house ads for the brand, etc.).
Platforms for usage would also be unlimited: desktop, web, apps, epub, etc. And it would be in perpetuity, so no page count limits or expiration time. Just one flat fee.
Any thoughts about something reasonable?
Thanks!
I would also structure the supplier licensing (them giving it to third parties) as an additional license & licensing fee, only available as an add-on for unlimited licensing customers.
At the risk of being off-topic too, I am just wondering what the intent of your message is. Do you mean that customers should realize that there are free alternatives and that basically all fonts are interchangeable anyway? This will make Libre fonts forceful weapons in the hands of potential customers for negotiations, I reckon. If that is what you mean, then I think that you should rephrase ‘Libre/open fonts are about freedom, not price’* into something like ‘Libre/open fonts are about restricting the freedom of non-Libre designers because of their price’.
* https://fontlibrary.org/fr/guidebook/libre_open_fonts
Basically they want to use the font for whatever they please without having to worry.
The SIL Open Font License provide just that, a total and complete freedom in usage.
That does not imply that the the designer has to charge no money for it.
There are quite a few cases already of brands developing custom fonts under a Libre license: Intel's Clear Sans developed by Monotype, Mozilla's Fira Sans by Spiekermann and Carrois, Ubuntu developed by Dalton Maag. And you can bet they didn't did the work for zero-money.
So... don't be so quick to dismiss the SIL Open Font license. It's clearly not off-topic and also not a thread to your pricing negotiations. If you think about it without prejudice, it is just another possibility. Another option to add to the table, and you can price it even more expensive than a full lifetime exclusivity license.
One, pricing for add-on licensing is rarely done in a vacuum. Foundries price web embedding, just to take one, based on as assessment of the use (usually traffic) as applied to pricing tiers. So, the only choice when pricing for "unlimited clients and unlimited use with no time frame" is to price at your highest possible prices for a very high number of clients and uses. And even then you might be wrong.
Two, unless they are required to report each client project to you then you how no way knowing if a given observed use is licensed. And I'm sure they don't want to report to you since, as Pablo pointed out, the whole point of this seems to be to remove all friction for them.
If I did agree to this I'd do it for a short period (one or two years) as a test. I'd require they keep careful records so we could review and reassess the pricing at the end of that term.