Thinking of hiring in-house? Between salaries, benefits, and the hidden costs of downtime, you could be spending up to $180,000 annually. Discover how switching to a creative subscription can slash those costs to around $42,000 while giving your business the flexibility to scale work up or down exactly when you need to.
Creative content writer with a knack for storytelling that connects. Wielder of wit, turning “meh” into magic daily.
As a business owner, you've probably thought to yourself, "I need to hire someone full-time to handle this.
It feels like the right thing to do. Until the moment you actually run the numbers.Then, you realize you might be making an expensive commitment.
Let me walk you through what you're actually paying for.
Let's say you hire two people: a designer and a digital marketer.
Here's where your money actually goes:
The Salaries:
For a solid mid-level designer: $45,000–$60,000 a year.
For a Digital marketer: $50,000–$65,000.
You are looking at roughly $105,000–$125,000 in base pay.
The Benefits:
Health insurance, payroll taxes, 401(k) matching, workers' comp; that's another 25–30% on top. That’s another $26,000–$37,500.
Then there's software.
Adobe Suite alone is like $55–$85 per person per month.
Add in Figma, Monday.com, stock photos, and collaboration tools, and you're throwing in another $3,000–$5,000 a year.
Let’s not forget equipment and office space.
A desk, monitor, laptop, chair, and all the tech stuff that needs replacing every few years. That's $4,000–$8,000 per person annually.
The Silent Money Killer: Downtime
This is what kills most companies.
You are paying these two salaries whether they put in 40 hours of work or 10 hours of work that week. Even during slow months, you are still paying the full freight, and every brand has slow months. That's easily 10–20% of your annual budget going to idle time.
Real Total: $140,000–$180,000 per year
A solid creative subscription costs about $2,000–$5,000 a month. Let's say $3,500 to keep it real.
That's $42,000 a year.
And here's what's included in that:
No payroll headaches or tax filing
You can pause it in slow months, ramp it up when you need it
You're literally paying for work delivered, not for someone sitting at a desk.
Imagine you own a growing food business.
You've started getting more orders, your social media is gaining traction, and you're ready to advertise. You hire a designer for visuals and a digital marketer to run campaigns.
Within a few months, you're spending thousands every month in salaries, tools, and management time.
Then business slows slightly.
The costs remain.
Now imagine using a creative subscription instead.
During busy months, you submit more requests.
During quieter periods, you scale back.
For many small and medium-sized businesses, that's a much safer position to be in.
Let's get real about the stuff money can't measure.
Hiring sucks. Finding, interviewing, and training two people takes months. If one doesn't work out, you've already sunk $15,000+ in wasted salary. But with a subscription, if it's not working, you switch.
Turnover is expensive. People leave, and it happens. Replacing them costs 50–200% of their salary. That's a problem you don't have with a subscription.
Flexibility actually matters. Some months, you need a ton of creative work. Some months you need almost none. An in-house team is a locked-in cost, every month, no matter what.
You get access to everyone with a subscription; you're not hiring one designer. You have access to designers, strategists, animators, and UX people; whoever you need, whenever you need them.
Which One Is Right for You?
A creative subscription is the lower-cost, lower-risk choice.
The only time hiring in-house wins is if you have super steady work year-round.
Through Branderah’s creative subscription model, you get access to professional design, content creation, branding, marketing support, website updates, and more.
Reach out today — we’d love to hear from you! Let’s bring your vision to life.
