[hiharryhere]

This is really topical for me as I'm looking for answers to this question too.

As someone in early bootstrapping stages, I want to develop some basic branding (colours, logo, sample applications etc) but I need to be realistic about budget. I'm happy to pay market rate and reduce the scope of what I'm after to to make it affordable.

Does anyone have experience striking the right balance of cost and quality?

[michaelbuddy]

shop around locally, really investigate with phone calls what you can expect roughly.

I would also help to create an RFP, request for proposal or request for estimate so you outline what you are looking for, what you have, and then see if various contacts bite at all and give a proper estimate or itemization.

You can get a lot of ideas quickly from using the 99 designs type sites. Basically logo farms kind of pull stuff from their reserves and some of them might stick. You'll get plenty of garbage but I doubt you'll say it' was a waste because you'll probably get some great baseline ideas to work from. It's really affordable, though admittedly a bit exploitative. Still it's those group's choices that they want to participate / submit so it's not like you're forcing them to submit. Find a way to pay out so not to be too exploitative, hows that.