Stationery and letterhead refers to letters, envelopes, thank you cards, invitations (including wedding invitations), invoices, receipts, and so much more.

Whether you’re rebranding an existing business or starting a business, custom stationery and letterhead design is important to create a strong brand.

Your company’s brand identity (everything visual about your brand) is one of your most valuable assets. And, consistent branding is the best way to build strong relationships with your customers. So, you should view your designs across all mediums as a long-term investment.

But, design companies and agencies typically charge thousands to tens of thousands of dollars for their services. And, you can easily find an amateur designer who will create a generic design from a template for only $5!

With such a wide price range, it can be tough to identify the sweet spot that will deliver you an awesome, custom stationery and letterhead design for a reasonable price.

Here are important elements that you should look for when you buy design services:

• Custom, Brand-Informed Design. Look for designers or design firms who create unique, original designs that fit your brand. That's one reason why crowdspring thoroughly vets, in every single design category, every designer who applies to work on crowdspring. It's also the readon we accept only a small number of applicants.


• Collaborative Process. Design is a collaborative process. If the designer doesn’t provide proofs for your review and isn’t willing to make changes based on your feedback, any price is too high. As an example, here’s how design projects on crowdspring work.


• IP Protection. Stock art and templates create problems with trademarking and protecting your design. Without a unique brand identity, you expose your business to potential future lawsuits. If the designer or design company lacks the procedure for preventing intellectual property and transferring ownership to you, any price is too high.


• The Final Deliverables. In the design world, the design files you walk away with are called your final deliverables. For each type of design, you should receive specific high resolution and low resolution files, suitable for online and print use.

Obviously, the most cost effective option is to create your own stationery and letterhead design. By using free design applications, or those you already own, you can craft your own stationery and letterhead based on your own vision.

But not everyone has the talent, or time, to make a DIY design. Plus, doing so would require you to know, or learn, a graphic design application such as Adobe Illustrator ($20.99/month) or Affinity Designer ($49.99).

Moreover, you also have to print them yourself – increasing your cost of production. Instead, some brands in this range turn to online template makers, which provide generic stationery and letterhead designs. These online printers charge anywhere from $0 to $50 just for the design(s), but can cost upwards of $150 if you print with them, too.

If you have a slightly bigger budget and need a high-quality professional stationery and letterhead design, freelance designers and design contests are your best option (both options are available on crowdspring). They also happen to deliver the best overall value.

Freelancer designers can invest their time to create custom, unique designs that will help you stand out from the competition. You can share your company values and your vision, and have a professional designer create unique stationery and letterhead that reflects your unique brand.

Usually, freelance designer costs fall in the following ranges:

• Offshore Designer: $150 – $250


• Beginner Freelancer: $250 – $1,000


• Experienced Freelancer: $1,000 – $5,000


• Renowned Freelancer: $5,000 – $15,000

Similarly, design contests, like those you find on crowdspring, also incorporate a high-quality, professional, and personable process. Yet design contests go a step further, and allow dozens of designers to submit their own unique designs. At the end of the project, you pick the one you love best! And, importantly, you set your own price.

With design contests, not only do you get that superior quality (with the added benefit of many options) – you get excellent service and communication, all wrapped up into one price.

Typical prices you can expect from design contests are:

• About 40 designs: $300 – $500


• About 60 designs: $500 – $800


• About 20 elite designs: $900-$1,000


• About 75 premium designs: $1,000+

A stationery and letterhead design contest is a perfect fit for individuals, small businesses, startups, growing businesses, agencies, and marketers.

If you have a big budget, and are already a well established, multinational business, or want the 'complete branding package,' then brand agencies are your best option.

Branding agencies are equipped with talented teams of creative professionals. If using an agency for your project, they dedicate a team of creatives to design and plan your brand’s logo and brand identity. They also create a consistent visual style across your platforms, completing the all-inclusive package deal.

But the price can be staggering and out of reach for most businesses. Depending on your needs, and your budget, the following ranges represent typical agency costs:

• Local Agency: $2,500 – $3,500


• Small Agency: $3,500 – $5,000


• Mid-Sized Agency: $5,000 – $10,000


• Large Agency: $10,000+

As you can see, brand agencies costs are significantly higher than other options. But, if you have the budget to invest heavily in your brand, this is a good option for you.

Below, we share questions you should ask before picking a designer or agency.

Original designs belong to the person who creates those designs, until intellectual property rights for those designs are legally transferred to a new owner.

In our digital world, where everyone has easy access to millions of designs on the web, it’s more important than ever to ensure that the designs you commission are original. Otherwise, you may find another business or designer knocking on your door with a cease-and-desist letter, requiring you to pay huge fines and forcing you to pay tens of thousands of dollars to rebrand.

That’s one reason why crowdspring, from the day we launched in 2008, has included a free, custom legal agreement transferring the full intellectual property rights to any original design you buy on crowdspring, to you. And, it’s also why crowdspring is trusted by tens of thousands of entrepreneurs, small businesses, brands, and agencies from over 100 countries.

A single designer can only excel in a limited number of unique design styles. And, the lower the price, the fewer design options you’re likely to see.

If you’re not 100% sure what you’re looking for, it helps to see many options. And, a team of a dozen designers all providing varying artistic perspectives will ensure that you’ll find a design that resonates with you.

Your designer should send you a range of file types so that you can flexibly use the design in the future.

The most commonly used file formats are PNG, SVG, EPS, and PDF. The designer should send you files in each of these formats in case you need a certain format for future use.

Each format has its benefits. Here’s a quick summary:

• For digital purposes – from presentations to image watermarks – use PNG files. You can also use PDF and other similar formats They have a clear background and are a small file size. However, they can lose quality when manipulating the size.


• For printing on business cards, clothing, shipping containers, and more, use vector files. Preferably, vector files such as SVGs, EPS or AI are the best because they conserve quality regardless of size. There is no disadvantage to use a vector files, making them an essential file for you to have. Just remember you might need special software to view and change vector files.


• When you later need to make changes to a design, use SVG, AI, or EPS files.

Design is a speculative field. You never really know what the end result will be. And, if you’ve been present and engaged in the creative process and you’re still not satisfied, sometimes it’s best to walk away.

Look for a designer, design company, or agency that offers a 100% Money Back Guarantee that covers all costs and fees paid.

Here are some of the classic warning signs a designer or design company may not be worth your money:

• They only ask basic questions like your business name and industry. A designer can’t differentiate you from other businesses when they aren’t asking questions specifically about your brand, the audience you want to reach, and the emotion you want your brand to convey.


• The price they are charging is too cheap to believe. For designers, time is money. A low price equates to little time and effort invested. This is true even for overseas designers who have become accustomed to being paid US rates for their design services. The quality of a design and the final deliverable files you’ll receive will both suffer if the price is too low. A unique, quality design evolves from a thoughtful and collaborative relationship with a designer - which will cost a bit more but is well worth the investment.


• No satisfaction guarantee. It’s a bad sign if the designer or design company doesn’t stand behind their work with a complete money back guarantee based on your satisfaction. If the designer isn’t confident enough in their work to offer a refund, why should you trust them with your brand’s visual identity?

If just one of these classic warning signs are present, you might want to keep looking for another designer or design firm.

Stationery includes business cards, envelopes, thank you cards, invitations, invoices, receipts, and so much more.

A letterhead is a heading on a piece of stationery. Letterheads typically include your business name, address, and your company logo or unique design. Put together, stationery and letterheads complement each other and create professional and consistent brand identity.

These days, information and authenticity is everything. People take the time to look into brands before stepping into the role of a customer or investor.

Prospective customers are typically looking for five different bits of information, depending on the type on stationery. Typically, these are found on a letterhead within the stationery. A personable letterhead contains:

• Who you are. You should provide your company name, your name, and your job title.


• What can you do for them? Make sure to state your company’s call-to-action or purpose.


• How to get in touch? You should clearly display your company’s number and, depending on the type of stationery, your cell number or personal office number, too.


• Where are you located? Be sure to indicate your office address and the hours of operation.


• A welcoming design. Simplicity goes a long way. Be sure your design is unique, reflects your brand, and follows your website and product branding.

There’s really not a more personal way to market your business. Stationery is made to add that unique charm and, with the correct information and design – it can make your business more attractive and memorable.

Brand Awareness is no one-and-done process. Rather, it’s a lifetime strategy for your business. As such, one of the most important aspects of branding is through visual elements such as logos, websites, and stationery. Therefore, stationery and letterheads should echo the ambiance of your logo and product designs.

If properly designed, they are impactful, memorable, and evoke emotions. Stationery and letterhead should be distinguishable from competition and give a face to your brand. They act as important starting points for potential customers or investors to take the next step with your company.

Ultimately, your stationery and letterhead should have accurate, easy-to-read information. If people can’t easily read details like contact information or your company’s name, your design has failed. Also, make sure your stationery and letterhead have the most essential information and keep the design elements minimal.

To go two-sided, or to not go two-sided? When designing stationery such as letters, it is important to plan out your design in a simple, yet effective way.

In fact, for all stationery it is essential to carefully plan how to meaningfully use the limited space available.

Your stationery and letterhead are a fundamental part of your brand, so it should be clean and well-structured. Multi-surface designs might work well for your brand, or it may be better to stick to one side only. In general, when in doubt err on the side of simplicity.

Flimsy materials are like limp handshakes: they feel terrible in your hand and leave a poor first impression.

The quality of the material you choose reflects on your business or products. If you’ve picked fragile paper for letters, or have printed menus on cheap cardstock, you may make people feel like they’re dealing with an unreliable or low-quality company.

We know you have many choices to design stationery and letterhead for your company or organization. The most common method is to hire a freelance designer, and you can work 1-to-1 with an expert designer on crowdspring.

There are other ways to get your stationery and letterhead. For example, you can crowdsource your design by starting a stationery and letterhead design contest on crowdspring.

Nothing makes us happier than connecting people, businesses, agencies and nonprofits with talented designers.

We have a terrific community of logo designers, graphic designers, web designers, illustrators, product designers and namers. Over 220,000 talented creatives from 195 countries work on crowdspring.

When you post your custom design project on crowdspring, you’ll get custom designs submitted by designers from all over the world. You won’t have to waste your valuable time digging through bids and proposals. You’ll pick your favorite from actual designs. In fact, clients have told us that choosing their favorite is the hardest part of the whole process!

When using crowdspring for custom design services, you can focus on getting the best result possible. We take care of everything else. With our award-winning customer service, hassle-free guarantee, customized legal agreements, strict intellectual property standards and fantastic project management tools, we know you’ll be happy. And if you’re happy, we’re happy.

And if you prefer to work with a single designer, we’ve got you covered. Just like a traditional crowdspring project, in 1-to-1 projects, you decide how much your project will cost. The minimum price for a 1-to-1 project starts at $200 (which includes crowdspring’s fee) and you can always increase the award.

Designers receive 100% of your award. Our fees cover the cost to host the project, our award-winning tools, escrow and payment, and custom contracts and non-disclosure agreements.

You and the designer you pick will be able to negotiate both the scope and the price for the project. When determining your award amount, please remember to price your project based on the scope of work. More labor-intensive projects deserve larger awards than very simple projects. You can set your own budget or you can ask the designer to provide a price quote based on the scope of work. It’s your choice.

We like to have fun at crowdspring, but we take our business very seriously. Although the vast majority of the businesses we work with are smaller, we regularly work with the world’s best Brands, including Amazon, LG, Random House, Starbucks, Barilla, Phillips and many more. We also regularly work with many of the world’s best agencies - and tens thousands of entrepreneurs and startups from over 100 different countries.

We would love to help you!