[egypturnash]

Only $7/wk for rush jobs? Damn that sounds like a shit deal for the person actually doing the work, even if y'all take absolutely nothing off the top. I wouldn't touch that kind of deal with a ten foot pole, even if I was shitting out the most banal, generic work possible.

Oh okay that's just the first week trial period, it's a monthly rate of $500 for "graphic" work or $1000 for "product", that's not as shit but it's still like $16 or $32/day (not accounting for weekends, I don't feel like seeing if your rules cover that, and again that's before your fees and any payment processing fees), and that's still sure not anywhere near what I'd be charging for a month of 24h turnaround.

[Pavlyshyna]

Hi! Thank you for pointing out our pricing. I totally agree it's not final and we might want to reconsider it to keep the high standards. Now all of the designers are based in Europe and we can be more cost-effective.

Regarding the promo $7 trial — this price is not because the work is worthless. We pay for you trying Awesomic :) After testing some boring targeting, we decided to pay our designers instead of paying Facebook Ads. It seems promising as designers' work "sells" itself and clients can test everything live — like turnaround, quality and communication.

[adampk]

Very great response to maybe not the most polite version of a good question, love the energy!

[egypturnash]

I'm an artist; I'm gonna reflexively resist anything that looks like uberization of my craft. :)

[adampk]

Totally get it! :)

[Pavlyshyna]

thank you for the support!

[egypturnash]

"Paying designers instead of paying Facebook Ads" sounds good! What kind of rates are you paying the people who're actually doing the work, though? And what's your plan for when the funding runs out - are you gonna follow Uber's path and start shaving more and more out of what the designers get?

Aaand... if a client and designer who you matched up decide they would like to pursue a working relationship outside of your app, without paying you your cut for future work, do you consider this a success, or a failure?

[romasevastyanov]

> What kind of rates are you paying the people who're actually doing the work, though?

We pay middle and middle+ rates in locations where we hire designers. So, Awesomic designers get the same or even more than other designers in the same location. Also, we have paid days off, and we are working on free health care program for our designers. So, does Upwork has paid day-offs or free health care program?

> And what's your plan for when the funding runs out - are you gonna follow Uber's path and start shaving more and more out of what the designers get?

We've been profitable for two years before we joined YC. Even now, we are profitable and haven't used YC's $125k. Still, we are raising money to hire more developers to build a better product – platform. Create an excellent product with AI – is super hard and expensive.

> if a client and designer who you matched up decide they would like to pursue a working relationship outside of your app without paying you your cut for future work, do you consider this a success, or a failure?

In two years working on this concept – we haven't had any cases like that. Designers like to work with Awesomic because they can grow and develop new skills on different projects. I am always happy when we deliver a great project after long cooperation.

Here is an example of how Norvegian startup worked with our designers for 18+ months in a row – https://www.awesomic.io/case-study/entirebody

[disruptthelaw]

I haven’t seen the terms of the deal but it presume that most customers on the monthly retainer will not submit a task every day, maybe on average every 4 or 5 business days. That changes the maths quite a bit

[notahacker]

Determining "fair use" could be the challenging bit. Sounds like the potential clients who see a flat monthly fee as the attraction are the ones who could really benefit from having a designer on payroll but don't have the funds

[Pavlyshyna]

Yes, thank you! We guarantee 24h turnaround Mon-Fri. The designers matched keep working with the same brands for a long time (we have 18+ months client already, one of the early ones) so they need weekends for sure.