What’s the real cost of creating a brand?
It's not as financially accessible as the internet likes to make out.
Everything you should be thinking about before starting a brand, or maybe you’re just nosy, as well as a handy cheat sheet to download.
I was naïve when I launched Faace. I’d been in PR and marketing for 15 years, so felt like I had a lot of bases covered when it came to where we’d need to spend budget – I was wrong.
Also, since announcing the closure of Faace, a lot of people are starting to show interest in taking the reins. Whether something comes of this remains to be seen. But it’s got me thinking about the value that’s still left in the business - and that there’s still something there to be had. People (me) can (did) underestimate the costs in creating a brand from scratch. Which is why I want to demystify what these actually are. And for once, I don’t mean the costs of the mental toll, I mean the money.
There are ALWAYS exceptions to any rules. Three beauty powerhouses - Sali Hughes, Jo Jones and Sam Chapman have just launched “pop-up” brand RUM. Their strategy seems to be more about selling to a smaller, but engaged beauty network, which of course makes sense if you’re as well connected and seasoned as these three are. But, this guide is more of a general rule of thumb.
A lot of costs are a “how long is a piece of string” type situation. For example, to design your branding and packaging you could pay a freelancer a few grand and a branding agency 100 thousand. Nonetheless, you’re starting with a significant investment to bring your vision to life.
Here’s a brain dump of all the costs I can think of - so you don’t blindly set up a business without knowing the facts.
THE COSTS
For branding as a guideline, you could be looking at:
Brand creation/packaging designed = £5,000
Brand deck = £1,000
Copywriter / tone of voice work = £1,000
Other assets that might be required = £1,000
Total = £8,000
Product
Even if your product development is free, you might be looking at 50p per packaging item with a 5 or 10K minimum order and £4 per fill, with a minimum order of 3K a time.
That means spending between £2,500 - £5,000 on packaging, plus £12,000 to fill it with your formula.
You need to buy barcodes (annually), you might want to trademark. This could be another £1,000 added on.
Also, some other legal costs that you might need to consider include things like getting Terms & Conditions, and a decent Privacy Policy (especially with GDPR), set up (excluded from here).
If you're launching a product in beauty, skincare, wellness, or food you’ll also need to consider product testing, certifications and getting all your paperwork robust e.g. Stability testing, safety assessments, Cosmetic Product Safety Reports (CPSRs). CPNP notifications (in the EU).
Total = add another £1,000–£3,000 per SKU (but this can vary a lot).
Total £15,500 to produce one product. But it’s unlikely you’ll be able to successfully launch a brand with one product in a year, so let’s guestimate this to at least times two.
Total = £31,000
Product photography
I’ve spoken about this before but this is not the area to scrimp. A decent selection of images will take you far – from your site to social and PR – these images will be used time and time again (and for years to come).
Total = £1,000 - £3,000 per shoot minimum.
Social media – annoying, because it doesn’t give you obvious ROI
Yes, Instagram is free to set up, but what are you going to post every day and who is going to do this for you? Like it or not, social is a window to any brand and people will view you here, maybe even before your website.
A lot of social accounts look really shit - and that’s usually because people aren’t investing. You need a good eye for content and a creative eye for nice design. This comes with a price tag and as a minimum you could spend:
Graphic design costs = 1 day a month at £500 (£6K per year)
Social management costs = you or someone else 1 day a month (hardly any time fyi but to do the minimum) £500 (£6K per year)
UGC content = £150 a video (4 a month at £600) £7,200 a year
Total = £19,200 a year
Your website
You can use all the Shopify apps and try and keep bespoke development to a minimum, but a website is an investment: from the content displayed to the copy to be read. Plus, all the snazzy functionality that helps convert customers. Also, you need to be prepared for things to go wrong and have someone on standby who knows how to fix this.
Total = £10,000 for the website launch would be a conservative number to set aside.
Marketing
Emails can be a great source of income, but you need good automatic flows and organic campaigns each month. A team to support could really benefit you in the long run, but you need to invest. You’ll also want your emails to be connected to your site for maximum conversion.
Total = £1,000 a month is the minimum to get someone to support you.
PR wise – you could work with a freelancer or agency, but to give someone enough time to have any kind of impact, and I mean basic pitching, not these experiential experiences you see all over social, you could be looking at anything from £2,000 to upwards of £5,000 a month.
Total £24,000 - £60,000 a year.
Total = £2,000 on products too (as you need to get these into people’s hands. 400 samples that cost you £5 each would be this for the year).
Affiliate goes hand in hand with PR in 2025 – you need to get your portal set up and pay an expert to get this up and running.
Total = say, at least £2,000.
Fulfilment
You need to get products to people and this could cost £1,000+ a month, (£12K per year), depending on how many units you sell.
Top tip: I do feel like this is where you can really save money when starting out. You can set up your own account and operate from your own space, which could save money when you’re not sending out loads of orders.
Earning a living yourself
You might think (again like me), that you can take a lot of this on yourself. But… surely your time should be billable? If you’re working on the business, then you can’t be working and earning anywhere else and why should you work on anything for free? Free doesn’t pay your bills or feed your kids.
So, even if you do decide to take on a lot of these tasks, you should really consider at what cost for your own income and mental wellbeing.
Financial management
Do you need an accountant for ongoing advice, to set up VAT and manage this each quarter, or something else to support the success of the business financially?
Total = £500 a month (£6,000 a year), could be a very low estimate.
Ongoing subscriptions
Then there’s all the always-on business running costs that you need to cover, such as:
Insurance £500 a month
Shopify apps £200 a month
Klaviyo so you can email people can easily be £100 a month
Inventory or booking tools £100
Awin for affiliates £200 a month
Total = approx. £1,000 per month for business running costs.
Other areas you could spend on (some you might not need to rush into)
Retailer agency support – retailer consultants to help you achieve retail placement or distributor placement.
Retail readiness in general – getting retailer pitch deck written and designed, preparing to visit trade shows, creating sales collateral like line sheets or sales decks and then let’s not even get into the retail margins you’ll need to absorb.
Customer service – not because I don’t care - that’s not why I’m saying don’t rush into spending here, but if you’re product and service is great and your website has a lot of information, then it’s unlikely you’ll have a lot of queries to deal with when you are starting out – so this should be manageable for you on a daily basis.
Plus a buffer for mistakes – you will need this, as things will go wrong. I can’t estimate how much or what you’ll need, but you should try and have a contingency in place.
The total budget at a glance
In case it’s handy, I’ve compiled all these costs in a table format in a downloadable cheat sheet. There are probably loads of things I’ve missed, but hopefully this will give you a good place to stop and think about the investment. And also ask yourself: how many products will you need to sell each month just to break even - let alone make an income?
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