Photo by Daniel McCullough on Unsplash
If you've ever called a web designer and asked, "How much for a website?", you already know the script.
"Well, it depends. Let's hop on a call."
You hop on the call. They ask twenty questions about your business that have nothing to do with the website. They send a proposal a week later. The number on it is somewhere between $1,200 and $40,000, and you have no idea why.
I'm not going to do that here.
This post is exactly what I charge, exactly what's in each tier, and — more importantly — exactly why anything cheaper than $2,500 for a real custom site is either a template you could've built yourself, or a freelancer who's quietly losing money on your project and will eventually disappear mid-build.
You should know both of those things before you spend a dollar.
The actual prices
Three packages. Fixed prices. No "starting at." No "depending on scope."
| Package | Price | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Foundation | $2,500 | A real custom site, 5 pages, professional but minimal |
| Signature | $4,500 | Most popular. Up to 10 pages, full CMS, integrations |
| Growth | $9,500 | Built for businesses doing real revenue and real conversion |
A small disclosure before we go further: Crestwork Studio is in its first year. To build a public portfolio of case studies, the prices above are an introductory rate that's guaranteed through April 2027. Once five public case studies are live, full rates resume — Foundation moves to $3,500, Signature to $6,500, Growth to $12,500. If you sign during the introductory period, your build is locked in at the price on this page, regardless of when full rates kick in.
So the numbers in the table are exactly what you pay today. The post-portfolio rates exist for a reason — keep reading and the math will explain itself.
Why $2,500 is the floor (and not $800, or $1,500)
When someone quotes you $800 for a "custom" website, here's what's almost certainly happening:
They're using a template. A pre-built theme on Wix, Squarespace, Shopify, or WordPress. They're spending two hours swapping your logo and colors in, then handing it back. There's nothing wrong with that — except they're charging you a "custom" rate for a template build. If you'd bought the same template yourself and watched a YouTube video, you'd be at the same place for $20.
Or they're losing money and don't know it yet. A real custom website — designed from scratch, written from scratch, configured for your business specifically, optimized for SEO and Google Business Profile, hosted properly, with a CMS so you can edit it yourself — takes between 30 and 60 hours of skilled work. Do that math at any hourly rate above $25/hr and you'll see why $800 doesn't work.
What usually happens with the $800 quote is one of two things:
- They start strong, realize halfway through that they can't actually deliver what they promised at that price, and either ghost you or hand back something embarrassing.
- They finish, but they cut every corner that doesn't show on day one — no real SEO setup, no analytics, no Google Business Profile work, brittle code, no training. The site looks fine on launch. It quietly fails to bring in customers for the next year.
Either way, the cheapest quote is rarely the cheapest outcome.
So $2,500 is the floor at which it's actually possible to deliver a real custom site without hating your job or screwing the client. It's already a portfolio-period number — meaning I'm willingly taking less in exchange for case studies — and it's still above what any "$800 site" can reasonably promise. Anyone charging less is either a template shop pretending to be a custom one or someone who hasn't done this enough times to know what it actually takes.
What you're actually paying for at each tier
This is the part most pricing pages skip. Here's what's in the box.
Foundation — $2,500
Best for: a business that needs a real web presence right now, isn't doing complex e-commerce or scheduling, and wants something that won't have to be torn out and rebuilt in two years.
You get:
- A custom-designed 5-page site (not a template — actual design work, built around your brand)
- Mobile-first responsive design, tested on real phones
- A basic CMS so you can edit your own text and images on key pages
- On-page SEO optimization (titles, meta descriptions, headings, schema markup, sitemap, robots.txt)
- GEO optimization — the newer counterpart to SEO that helps you show up in AI search results (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews)
- A working contact form with email notifications
- Google Analytics + Search Console setup (so you can actually see your traffic)
- SSL + secure hosting
- One round of revisions during the build
- A launch training session so you can manage the site yourself
What's not in Foundation: blog, deep CMS for every page, multiple integrations, custom backend logic. Foundation is a real custom site — it's just minimal in scope. If you outgrow it, you upgrade to Signature without having to start over.
Signature — $4,500
Best for: an established business with real customers, real revenue, and a website that needs to do actual work — not just exist.
Everything in Foundation, plus:
- A fully custom design built around your brand (not a template)
- Up to 10 pages
- Full CMS — every page is editable, including a real blog
- Up to 2 contact forms with custom email integrations
- Google Business Profile setup + optimization (the single highest-leverage thing for local SEO that nobody does properly)
- Two rounds of revisions during the build
- A live, recorded training session at launch — so anyone you hire later can come up to speed
This is the package most clients land on. It hits the sweet spot of "this site actually moves the business" without paying for a custom backend you don't need yet.
Growth — $9,500
Best for: businesses generating real revenue who need the site to convert, integrate, and scale.
Everything in Signature — including the live, recorded training session at launch — plus:
- Custom integrations — up to 2 (your CRM, booking system, or client portal)
- E-commerce capability for up to 20 products
- Advanced SEO + GEO optimization with competitor analysis
- Up to 4 conversion-optimized landing pages
- A/B testing setup
- Quarterly strategy reviews for the first year
Growth is for the businesses that already know what their website should be doing — they just need someone who can actually build it. If you don't know yet whether you need Growth, you don't need Growth.
What's always included, regardless of tier
There are some things I refuse to nickel-and-dime, because charging extra for them tells me you don't actually believe in the work.
- SEO and GEO optimization. Every site, every tier. There's no "premium SEO add-on." Either I optimize your site to be found, or I'm not doing my job.
- Analytics setup. Google Analytics 4 + Search Console, configured properly, with conversion events tracked. If I build you a site and don't give you the tools to see whether it's working, I'm selling you a brochure.
- Hosting for the first year. Included. After year one, hosting is around $20–$40/month, depending on traffic. (You can host it anywhere — I just default to setting you up well.)
- Training. A real session, recorded on Signature and Growth, so you can edit the site yourself or hand it to whoever you hire later. No vendor lock-in.
- The code. It's yours. If you ever want to take it to another developer, you can. (The number of agencies that won't tell you this is alarming.)
What costs extra
Honesty cuts both ways. Things that aren't in any of the tiers and that I quote separately:
- E-commerce beyond 20 products (full inventory, complex checkout, shipping calculations) — quoted on top of your tier. There's a reason Shopify is a $200B company.
- Custom integrations beyond what's included — quoted per integration, usually $500–$2,500 each.
- Copywriting. I can write your site copy, but it's a separate engagement. Most clients write their own, and I polish — that's free.
- Logo + brand identity. I can recommend people, but it's not what I do.
- Photography. Same — I'll point you at someone good.
Why I'm telling you all this
Most agencies hide their pricing for one of two reasons.
Reason one: Their pricing isn't actually fixed. They're going to look at your business, sniff out how much budget you have, and price the proposal at "the most you'll say yes to." That's not a relationship — that's a negotiation, and it starts you out on the wrong foot.
Reason two: They're not confident their pricing is fair. If they had to defend it on a public webpage, they'd lose the argument. So they keep it behind a "let's hop on a call."
Neither one is something I'm willing to do. I'd rather post the actual numbers, lose a few prospects who were never going to be a fit, and spend my time talking to people who already know what they're getting into.
If $2,500 is more than you can spend right now, that's a real and legitimate answer — and you should not be talked into a custom build by anyone. A well-set-up Squarespace or Wix site, done thoughtfully by you over a weekend, is the right move when the budget is tight. I'd rather you do that than overextend on a build you can't comfortably afford.
If $4,500 for a Signature site sounds about right for where your business is, then you and I should have a conversation. Not a sales call — an actual conversation about whether what I build is the right fit for your needs. Sometimes it isn't, and I'll tell you that.
Book a 30-minute discovery call and we'll figure it out together. No proposals you have to chase down, no "let me get back to you" — by the end of the call, you'll know exactly what tier fits, what it costs, and when it would be ready.
That's how this should work.