Having worked on both sides (first hiring designers in a European nonprofit and now as a freelance designer myself), I know how budget-conscious a nonprofit sometimes has to be when hiring a designer, whether it’s for branding, a report layout or a website. And if your project is funded by a public body like the European Commission, you likely have a series of rules to follow: a procurement process, a minimum number of quotes to collect, criteria to justify your choice.
So you send your brief to five designers, hoping at least three will respond so you have a proper comparison. But before you get there, make sure you have a clear idea of your budget and needs, and a solid brief to communicate them. I’ll be covering how to write a good design brief in my next post, but for now let’s focus on who you might work with.
Working with a design agency
An agency brings a team of specialists. That means more capacity, the ability to handle complex projects with multiple deliverables, and often faster turnaround, since several people can work on your project at the same time. You also typically get a dedicated project or account manager who coordinates that team for you: one point of contact, someone keeping everything on track. For many organisations, this larger, more formal structure is reassuring, especially when you need to justify your choice internally or to a funder.
The trade-offs are mostly a matter of scope and budget. Agencies tend to cost more, because you’re paying for the team structure, the project management and the overheads. For a small association or nonprofit with a contained project (e.g. a report layout or a basic website), that structure may be more than you need. For a large, multi-format project, it may be exactly what you need.
Working with a solo freelance designer
With a freelancer, you work directly with the person doing the work. No intermediary between your brief and the final result, so your feedback reaches the person who applies it, directly and immediately.
The relationship also tends to be closer and more informal, sometimes more like working with a colleague, while remaining fully professional. And once you find a freelancer you trust, that relationship often lasts: they get to know your organisation, your brand and the way you work, which makes every following project smoother.
Cost is generally lower too, not because the work is worth less, but because there’s no structural overhead. That saving can go back into the project, or into your budget for something else.
The risks are real but often overstated. Capacity is more limited. A solo freelancer can’t absorb a sudden doubling of scope the way a team can. And yes, if they get sick, your project might be delayed. But a professional freelancer plans for this: realistic timelines with buffer, clear documentation, sometimes a trusted network of collaborators they can call on. It’s worth asking about upfront – any serious freelancer will have a clear answer.
Doing it yourself
If you have the design skills, the time, and the eye for it, and you can meet the visual standards your organisation needs, then why not? The budget saved could go toward something more complex, where a professional’s input will have a bigger impact.
The tools available today make self-sufficiency more realistic than it used to be. Canva is accessible and widely used; Affinity is professional-grade and now completely free. If you’re somewhere in between (capable of following a template but not of building one from scratch) a designer can create a solid foundation for you to work from. A well-built Canva template or an Affinity file structured for non-designers can be a smart investment: you get high quality on the recurring work, without depending on a designer for every update. Pairing it with a brand book or style sheet means anyone on your team can create new content that still feels like your brand (Check out my article on what brand guidelines are and who needs them).
The key here is knowing your limits. A DIY approach works well for social media posts or internal documents. For a full rebrand or a public-facing website, the risk of an inconsistent or unprofessional result is higher – and the cost of fixing it later often exceeds what you’d have spent on a designer upfront. And if the shortcut that tempts you is an AI website builder, I look at that case in more detail in this article.
So, how do you choose?
There’s a well-known concept in project management: you can have something done well, done fast, or done cheaply, but rarely all three at once. Design projects are no different. The question isn’t which option is objectively best, but which trade-offs make sense for your project, your budget, and how you like to work.
A large agency makes sense when you need high capacity, fast turnaround, and have the budget to match. A solo freelancer makes sense when direct communication and cost efficiency matter more than speed or scale. And if you have the skills, the time, and a good creative foundation to start from, doing it yourself (or working from templates a designer has built for you) is a perfectly legitimate choice for the right type of project.
Whichever route you take, one thing applies across all three: sector knowledge matters. A provider (agency or freelancer) who already understands your world will hit the ground running. It’s worth asking about their experience with organisations like yours before you commit.
And before you start looking, be clear about what you need. That’s exactly what a good brief is for (and that will be the topic for my next post).
