I don't compete on dollars per square foot

Adapted from my conversation with Branson Bowen on episode one of Beyond the Blueprint.

The most common pushback I used to get on fees, and still get occasionally, is some version of: I found someone who'll do this for X dollars a square foot.

My honest first reaction is arithmetic, because at the rates people quote me I've never been able to work out how that firm feeds itself. You'd have to run an enormous volume of projects to make the numbers close, and at that volume nobody is spending time on your project specifically, which is fine if what you want is a permit set. That's a real product. It just isn't the same product.

The distinction matters more than it sounds like it should, because architectural services have been thoroughly commodified over the last couple of decades. The role used to be a professional retained to oversee an entire design and construction process, and it has drifted toward a deliverable: a set of drawings, priced by area, handed over at the end. There aren't many firms, here or in the other markets I've worked in, that want to get into the nitty-gritty of the details, or to be on board from site selection with clients who don't even have a project yet, through the design process, and then through construction, making site visits and performing contract administration so the thing the client paid for during design is the thing that actually gets built.

The other half of the argument is about who our clients are. If you've never taken on a commercial or residential design and construction project, there's a decent chance this is the only one you'll ever do. People don't build their dream home three or four times, and most of them haven't done it once, so the value of having a trusted adviser through the whole process rather than someone who hands you drawings and wishes you a nice day is concentrated entirely in the one shot you get.

That's what I'd rather sell: a comprehensive set of drawings instead of the bare minimum the building department will accept, and problem solvers instead of draftspeople with a stamp. It's a harder sale than a number on a page and it takes longer to explain, though I don't see that as a problem, since the clients who want the cheaper version aren't clients I'd serve well anyway.

Listen to the full conversation

This post came out of episode one of Beyond the Blueprint with host Branson Bowen, where we got into starting the firm in April of 2020, holding a license without holding the decisions, and what it actually costs to add an architect to a small practice.