Logo design cost in Switzerland

The short answer, in figures

On the Swiss market, a logo commissioned on its own is typically quoted between CHF 500 and CHF 1'500. A full visual identity, meaning the mark plus the system that makes it usable, is commonly quoted between CHF 1'200 and CHF 3'500. A complete brand programme, where positioning and naming sit alongside the design work, is commonly quoted between CHF 8'000 and CHF 25'000. These are ranges observed on the market, not a tariff, and any individual quote can sit outside them for reasons that are perfectly legitimate.

The important thing about those three figures is that they are not three quality levels of the same product. They are three different purchases. A buyer who pays for the first and expects the second will be disappointed, and a buyer who pays for the third when the first would have done has bought a lot of work that will sit unused. If a price comparison feels incoherent, the first thing worth checking is whether the two quotes are answering the same scope question at all.

There is a second reason the numbers vary. The price of an identity is the price of time and judgement, not the price of a file. Two studios can spend very different amounts of effort arriving at marks that look comparably simple, and simplicity in a logo is usually expensive rather than cheap, because a mark that has to hold together at very small sizes, in a single colour, under poor reproduction, and across a shop window has had decisions removed from it rather than added.

Logo, visual identity, brand programme: three different purchases

Before comparing two prices, compare two scopes. The table below sets out what each level actually delivers and where the market ranges sit. The studio's own price is deliberately kept out of the range column, because a single studio's published price is not market data and should never be read as one; it is stated separately at the end of this page.

The line that matters most is the one between the first and second rows. A logo on its own is a drawing. A visual identity is a set of decisions that survives being handed to a printer, a sign maker, a developer and whoever writes the next brochure. If a business is going to produce anything beyond a single signboard, the second row is usually the real requirement. If the first row is bought instead, each of those later surfaces will still need its own design decision made by someone, and those decisions will be commissioned one at a time rather than together.

The third row is a different order of commitment. It is worth the money when the brand has to hold a position against competitors, carry a name that does not yet exist, or run consistently across many surfaces and several teams. For a company where one person makes the decisions and the touchpoint list is short, much of a brand programme's output would be documentation that never gets opened. The service side of this work, including how a Swiss brand handles more than one language, is covered on the branding service page rather than here.

What actually drives the price of an identity

At equal scope, two quotes can still differ substantially. The reasons are usually concrete and can be asked about directly. These five factors move a Swiss identity quote more than anything else.

The number of applications

A logo becomes an identity when it is drawn against real surfaces. Every additional application, whether that is packaging, a vehicle, a shopfront, a uniform, an email signature template or a set of social profile crops, is a separate design problem with its own constraints. A quote covering three applications and a quote covering fifteen are not the same job, and the applications list is the single easiest thing to compare between two proposals. Ask for it in writing.

Whether a naming exercise is included

Naming is a separate discipline with its own timeline, and it is one of the few parts of brand work with a hard external dependency: the name has to be available, both as a trademark in the relevant classes and as a usable domain. That verification work sits outside the design process and takes as long as it takes. If a quote includes naming, the price reflects a research phase that a design-only quote does not carry.

How many languages the identity has to survive

A mark designed once and used in one language is a simpler object than one that has to hold up across French, German, Italian and English. The pressure shows up in specific places: a tagline lockup whose proportions break when the translated line runs longer, a wordmark built around a word that only exists in one language, and layouts that were spaced for one text length. Building for several languages from the start costs less than retrofitting later, and the number of languages should be named in the brief rather than discovered halfway through.

How many people have to approve it

Decision structure is a price factor, not a personality quirk. Each additional approver adds a review cycle, and each cycle consumes time that has to be quoted for. A project with one decision-maker can move through revisions in days. A project where a committee reviews each round moves at the speed of the committee's calendar. Neither is better, but a quote priced for one approver against a project that turns out to have five will run over, and the overrun will surface as a variation request rather than as a design disagreement.

Whether source files and usage rules are delivered

This is the quietest of the five and the most consequential. Delivering editable source files and written usage rules is real work: the files have to be organised, the variants built out properly, the colour values specified for more than one output, and the rules written so that someone who was not in the room can follow them. A quote that excludes this is a smaller scope than a quote that includes it, and the two should be compared as different scopes rather than as two prices for the same thing. What a complete handover contains is set out further down this page.

What an automated or template-based logo service can and cannot deliver

Online marketplaces, template libraries and generated-mark services offer a finished logo far below any figure in the table above, usually within minutes or days. The promise is accurate on speed and on price. The question worth asking is not whether the people behind these services are doing something wrong, because they are not, but what that format is structurally able to include and what it is not.

What such a service can genuinely deliver: a usable mark, quickly, at a price that suits a project with a short life or a fixed and modest budget. For a one-off event, a personal side project, a concept being tested before any real investment, or an internal tool that will never be seen by a customer, that can be entirely sufficient, and commissioning a full identity for it would be the actual mistake.

What the format frequently does not include, and what should therefore be checked before purchase rather than after, is the following. None of this is a criticism of the sellers; it is a description of scope.

• Exclusivity. A template can be sold to more than one buyer, and a generated mark can be regenerated. Whether a given service guarantees an exclusive mark, and states that guarantee in writing, is a question to put before paying.
• Editable vector source files. Some services include them, others supply raster exports only, and some supply vector files under restricted terms. Without an editable vector master, the mark cannot be enlarged cleanly, recoloured, or adapted for a printer or a sign maker.
• Written usage rules. Clear spacing, minimum sizes, what may and may not be done to the mark, and which version goes on which background. Without them, every supplier who touches the brand makes their own call.
• Variants for real conditions. A single-colour version, a reversed version for dark backgrounds, and a simplified version drawn for very small sizes. A mark that only exists in one full-colour form will eventually be scaled down or printed in one ink by someone, and the result is outside anyone's control.
• Clarity on the typography licence. Which typefaces the mark uses, what the licence covers, and whether it transfers to the buyer. This is dealt with in its own section below because it is the item most likely to produce a cost after the fact.
• Any research into the sector, the competitive field or the audience. A mark produced without that context may be perfectly attractive and still say nothing specific about the business it belongs to.

A practical way to use this section: decide first how long the mark has to last and how many hands will touch it. If the answer is a few months and one person, a low-cost route is a reasonable decision and this page is not arguing otherwise. If the answer is several years, a printer, a sign maker and a web developer, then each missing item above becomes something that has to be commissioned separately later, and the total of those separate commissions is what should be compared against the price of buying them together at the start.

The files to insist on receiving

This is the most useful test available to a buyer who cannot judge design quality with confidence: ask, before signing, exactly which files will be delivered. The answer says more about the seriousness of a proposal than the portfolio does. A professional identity delivery is never a single PNG. The list below is what a complete handover looks like, and each item exists because something breaks without it.

The vector master

The editable source file the logo was actually built in, commonly an .ai or .eps file, or the native file of whichever vector tool was used. This is the original. Everything else on this list can be regenerated from it, and nothing on this list can replace it. A delivery without a vector master leaves the buyer dependent on the original designer for any change at all, including changes as small as adjusting spacing in a lockup.

SVG for screen

The vector format the web uses. An SVG stays sharp at any size, weighs very little, and can have its colours changed in code, which matters for dark backgrounds and for interface states. Any developer building a site will ask for this file first. Supplying a PNG instead means the logo will be a fixed-resolution image on every screen it appears on.

PDF for print

The format printers and sign makers work with. A press-ready PDF carries the vector artwork with the colour information intact, which is what allows a print supplier to reproduce the mark without redrawing it or guessing at values. Ask for the print PDF specifically, separately from any presentation PDF of the design work.

Favicon and small-size variants

A logo at browser-tab size, at app-icon size, or embossed on a small object is a different design problem from the same logo across a wall. Fine detail disappears, thin strokes vanish, and a horizontal lockup becomes unreadable. A proper delivery includes a simplified or cropped variant built for small sizes, plus the favicon files a website needs. Without them, someone will eventually scale the full mark down and the result will be a smudge.

Colour values for screen and for print

Screen and print do not produce colour the same way, so a palette needs more than one set of values. For screen, HEX or RGB. For print, CMYK values, and where a colour must be reproduced identically across different suppliers and materials, a spot colour reference as well. A palette handed over with screen values only will drift the moment anything is printed, and the drift tends to be noticed after the print run rather than before.

The typography licence question

This one is easy to overlook and can be expensive. Typefaces are generally licensed rather than owned, and licences are commonly sold by use: desktop use, web use and app use are typically separate permissions, often priced by the number of workstations or by web traffic volume. A licence held by a designer does not automatically transfer to the client. So the question to ask, in writing, is: which typefaces does this identity use, what does the licence cover, who holds it, and what will it cost annually going forward. If the answer is that the identity uses open-source typefaces, the question resolves itself and that is worth knowing too.

Alongside the files, expect the variants that real use requires: the primary colour version, a monochrome black version, a white or reversed version for dark backgrounds, and a horizontal or stacked alternative where the layout demands it. Ask for the whole list at quotation stage, not at delivery. A supplier who intends to hand everything over will have no difficulty confirming it in advance.

What the brief needs to contain before a price means anything

A quote can only be priced against what it has been told. Two proposals that differ sharply are often responses to two different readings of the same vague brief, and the fastest way to make a comparison meaningful is to give both parties the same five pieces of information in writing before either one puts a figure on it.

• The list of surfaces the mark has to appear on, named individually rather than described as "the usual": signage, packaging, vehicle, uniform, website, print documents, social profiles.
• The languages the identity has to work in, decided at the start rather than added later.
• Who approves the work, and how many people that is in total.
• Whether a name already exists and is settled, or whether naming is part of the job.
• Whether the code and design source files, the usage rules and the licence information are to be handed over as part of the delivery.

Two further things belong in the brief and are frequently left out. The first is the date the identity has to be in use, as distinct from the date the design is signed off, because print production and signage have their own lead times that sit outside the design timeline. The second is what already exists: an old mark, a palette in use, a typeface already licensed, photography, a shopfront that cannot be changed. Constraints reduce the work when they are known at the start and increase it when they arrive halfway through.

With those points fixed, a difference between two prices becomes readable. It is either a difference in the number of applications, in the research included, in the review cycles allowed for, or in what is handed over at the end. Each of those can be discussed. A difference between two prices given against no brief at all cannot be discussed, because there is nothing to attach it to.

Rebrand or refresh: which one the situation calls for

Not every identity that feels tired needs replacing, and the cost difference between the two options is significant, so the diagnosis is worth doing carefully. A refresh keeps the existing equity and repairs what has stopped working. A rebrand replaces the mark and accepts that recognition built up so far will have to be rebuilt.

Signals that point towards a refresh rather than a rebrand:

• The mark itself still reads well, but it was never delivered in the formats current use requires, so every application is a workaround.
• The palette and typography have drifted because different suppliers made different choices, and what is missing is a written rule, not a new drawing.
• The logo works in print but fails at small sizes on screen, which is a variants problem rather than a design problem.
• The business has changed in scale but not in what it does or who it sells to.

Signals that a rebrand is genuinely the right purchase:

• The name no longer describes the business, or blocks it from operating in a market or a language it now needs.
• The company has merged, split, or changed its offer to the point where the current mark refers to something that no longer exists.
• The identity was built for one audience and the business now sells to a different one.
• The mark cannot be owned properly, for example because rights were never transferred or the design cannot be defended as distinctive.

A useful discipline: if the honest answer is that the identity is fine but the assets are incomplete, then the money is better spent on completing the system, which is a fraction of the cost of starting again. If a mark that was already working is redrawn, the spend lands at the top of the range and the thing that was actually broken, usually the missing files and the missing rules, is still missing afterwards unless it was scoped in.

Il Duca: what an identity delivered that a logo would not have

Il Duca is an artisan gelateria in Lausanne, and the brief was a good illustration of the distinction this page is built around. A logo alone would have produced a signboard. What the business actually needed was a mark that held its own on a street frontage, survived being reduced onto small packaging, and read as artisanal rather than as a chain, which is a narrower target than it sounds.

The work was built around an emblem, the figure of the duke, chosen because it carried the idea of care and refinement in a hand-made product. Around that emblem sat the parts that make a mark usable by other people: a palette that had to sit alongside the colours of the product itself without competing with it, typography, and variants drawn for two very different viewing distances, the shop window and the object in the hand.

The point of the case is not a growth figure, and none is offered here. It is the scope demonstration. A logo would have produced one drawing. An identity produced something the owner can hand to a printer, a packaging supplier and a sign maker without the design decisions being reopened each time, which is precisely what the second row of the table is paying for.

Where the CHF 1'500 identity sits, stated precisely

Fritz publishes a brand identity at CHF 1'500, a single one-off payment. Stated accurately: that figure sits inside the range observed on the market for a full visual identity, which runs from CHF 1'200 to CHF 3'500, and it sits near the bottom of that range. It is not below the market floor, and this page will not claim that it is.

What the CHF 1'500 covers is the second row of the table, not the first: the mark and the system around it, with the source files and the usage rules handed over as part of the delivery rather than as an extra. The indicative timeline is around fourteen days, which depends on the same decision-structure factor described earlier: one approver moves quickly, several move at the pace of the slowest calendar.

Fritz is one person, which sets a hard limit on how many identities can run at once and means timing has to be agreed rather than assumed; the full commercial terms, the other published prices and how the studio works are set out on the prices page. For the market-wide picture on websites rather than identity, the separate cost guide covers that ground. For the question of whether to approach a studio, an agency or an independent at all, the comparison page covers the structural side. The branding service page covers how an identity is run for a company operating across more than one Swiss language.

Frequently asked questions

Version française : prix d'un logo et d'une identité visuelle en Suisse →Branding agency in Switzerland →Web agency or freelancer in Switzerland →What a website costs in Switzerland →Published prices, all services →Selected work, including Il Duca →Ask for a free quote, reply within 24 hours →