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I used 99designs to get a book cover designed and I was very happy with the results. My designer was responsive, friendly, and made a wonderful design that went

I used 99designs to get a book cover designed and I was very happy with the results. My designer was responsive, friendly, and made a wonderful design that went above and beyond what I was expecting. However, I was unhappy with how little the designer actually received. I paid $799 to run the competition, and the winning designer only got $387! Charging >50% commission seems highly exploitative, especially when all the designers who don't get selected receive nothing at all despite spending spending time creating designs.

kirillzubovsky 13y ago
See my comment to the person above, /re why competitions are soul-sucking experiences for designers. Also, to your point about charging 50%+. Word is, 99Designs used to do very well, up until the point when the founder took on a huge VC investment and left the company. I guess since their business model is pretty much tapped out, they figured that raising margins would fix the slow growth.