How many hours to quote for a website?

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1

I’m about to write a request for an internship for this summer and I need to know how many hours to quote to build a web presence for a small town flower shop. They want a website that has their contact info plus all of their products and a shopping cart.

How many hours would a professional developer quote for this?

The more hours I quote the better really. I’m not getting paid, just more credit hours I can use up.

Thanks

2

Click here to see exactly how long it will take you.

3

This should fall into the FAQ category. The most professional designer on this site cannot answer that question. Sometimes things come together without a hitch but it usually does not. Building a website is like working on an old house, it usually takes twice as long as you originally think it will.

4

But a contractor is still going to give an estimate.

5

Yep, but his his contract will have stipulations for extra work and an experienced contractor knows working on an old house usually means many unforeseen obstacles.

6

But once again, they give an estimate. There aren’t any “professional” developers on here that can give an estimate? Web designers are the worst at this.

7

Hi Thad. You’re right, Web designers are often reluctant to give estimates. Usually there’s a very good reason why. In a case I’m currently dealing with, I contracted with a client to provide her a fully-formed site, a new domain name and server account, etc in 60 days from receipt of a signed contract. That’s a long time for something I could bang out over a couple of weekends :slight_smile: but since I work anywhere from 50 to 80 hours a week at non-design jobs, I wanted to give myself more than enough time to get it done. Now I’m starting to wonder if I am going to have to put through an extension, because she won’t send me the content I need to develop the site. :injured:

In other words, while there are knucklehead designers out there who play WOW online for three weeks out of the four they quote you on their contracts, and whack out the contracted site in the last few days of the contract term, that really doesn’t happen very often. What happens more often is that the designer runs into roadblocks thrown up by the client, whether deliberately or inadvertently, and the site development takes ten times the amount of time it should have.

Read this and then do two things:

  1. Think about the scope of the site and the amount of time you’d need to design it. If they want ten static pages with no fancypants CMS, Flash, JS, or what have you, and you figure you can design a page a day and still make it to class and down a few beers with the boys, estimate ten days to complete the design.
  2. Now double that figure for client oddities, and hope it doesn’t go even further.
8

Note to above: That estimate is seat-of-the-pants and based on your status as a student making one (1) site. A professional design firm, or full-time freelancer, would quote a very different time frame.

9

But a contractor is still going to give an estimate.

I would also obtain the full details about the project not just a shopping cart which could mean so many things.