With the economic slum that we are in many Graphic Designers are feeling the pinch. Freelancers are finding hard to get new contracts from new and old clients and others who work for corporate and design studios are finding that budget for print and promo has been cut deep which leads to job security issues to them.
This is common though when the economy is not doing well that in many companies the first to get slash is the marketing department. This can lead to laid offs for some Designers. The fact that in this time period there are not too many design position out there due to the cut back and companies are not confident with this recession yet to hire someone new. The ones who are hiring are taking advantage of this and are paying at an extremely low wage. I saw ads on Craigslist asking for a designer and web developer and paying a measly $10/hr. To me that was ridiculous, I mean I understand in the economic times that we shouldn’t be looking for $40/hr. or something, but that was way below average, not even a student in a design school should accept such a thing. I mean if someone was designing something for a charitable organization for pro bono, that I can totally understand.
So what do Graphic Designers do to survive??
Well, we need to use our creativity to help us promote ourselves. Talk to friends and families, they may want some design stuff done or their company does. Promote yourself and add your web site to respectable sites like the Graphic Designers of Canada (GDC), Register Graphics Designer (RGD), AIGA, etc… Go to various design events (assuming that they are free or not too expensive, because believe me some events/conferences can cost over $1000.00 to attend). Have ads posted on sites like Craiglist and tell everyone that you are free to meet for a free consultation. You might also need to do the dreaded cold call and email campaign (its something we all hate to do).