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Starter is $2,500 and the largest size, Complete, is $9,000. Both are one-time prices in Canadian dollars, with no monthly fee to me attached, and Grow sits between them at $6,000. These are what I charge, not an industry average. Four things move a site from the small number toward the higher one. How many pages you need, who writes the words, whether money changes hands on the site, and how many towns and services need a page of their own. The rest of this guide walks through each of those, shows what each size includes, and gives you the questions to ask before you pay anyone a deposit.
Want this handled instead of DIY'd? See the three fixed-price website sizes.
What actually moves the price
Four things, in rough order of how much weight they carry.
How many pages you need. A four-page site and a twelve-page site are different amounts of work, and four is a complete site for a one-service trade. I've written out what pages a small business website needs separately. Every page has to be written, laid out, checked on a phone, and then kept accurate for years afterward. Pages cost money even when they look like filler.
Who writes the words. When two quotes look identical and one is much cheaper, this is the line I would check first. If you hand a designer finished copy for every page, the build gets cheaper. If you don't have finished copy, that's normal, and nobody should have to write it at ten at night after a full day of running a shop. When I quote, writing is in the price. If a quote you're comparing seems low, ask whether it includes the words.
Whether money changes hands on the site. A site that tells people what you do and how to reach you is a small job. A site that takes bookings or payments is a bigger one, because now there is inventory, tax, refunds, failed cards, and a customer emailing you on a Sunday about an order. That is the real jump in price. It's worth paying for when you sell online, and worth nothing when you don't.
How many towns and services need their own page. A plumber in Welland who also works Port Colborne and Wainfleet is serving three local markets at once, and those want separate pages. One town, one service, one page is the cheapest version, and some businesses are exactly that: a barber on Jarvis Street in Fort Erie, or a bakery on Queen Street in Niagara Falls.
Notice what is missing from the list: how good it looks. On a small site, the writing and the structure cost more than the design.
Why I quote three fixed sizes instead of a custom number
Starter is $2,500, Grow is $6,000, Complete is $9,000. All three are in Canadian dollars, and every one of them is paid once.
Fixed sizing exists because a custom quote for a small site spends more of your money on quoting than on building. The shapes repeat. The barber and the bakery look nothing alike on the page, and they need almost the same set of parts underneath. Pricing those parts as three sizes means you can read the number on a web page in your own time, decide whether it's in range, and only then talk to me.
Starter is often the right answer, and I'll tell you so even when Grow is sitting right there on the same page. If you outgrow it in two years you move up a size, and nothing you paid for the first time gets thrown out.
Here's what each size includes; each one includes everything in the size before it.
| What you get | Starter | Grow | Complete |
|---|---|---|---|
| Price (one-time) | $2,500 | $6,000 | $9,000 |
| Built for | One clear front door online | More than one service, or more than one town | Selling, booking or managing members online |
| Pages | Home, about the work, a page or two for services, contact | Up to ten pages, one for each service and town | Everything in Grow, with room to add pages later without a rebuild |
| Copy written for you | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Built mobile-first | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Update your own pages | Yes, through a content management system (a screen where you change your own text) | Yes, plus a simple way to update hours, prices and news | Yes |
| Photo page or gallery | No | Yes | Yes |
| Online booking or a simple store | No | No | Yes |
| Members' area or gated content | No | No | Room for it, if your business runs that way |
| Domain, hosting and files in your name | Yes | Yes | Yes |
The last row is the one to read twice. "Domain" is your web address, "hosting" is the computer your site lives on, and both are registered in your name from the start.
Whatever size you pick, the site is yours to keep: the domain, the hosting account and every file are in your name from day one, not mine. If you ever want to leave, you take the whole thing with you, and I show you where the logins are at handover.
Red flags in a vague quote
- A quote that won't produce a number until you've sat through two meetings. A range should be possible after one conversation.
- A monthly fee with no end date and no list of what it buys. A standing "maintenance" charge on a five-page site, with nothing itemised, is a lease dressed as a service.
- A quote that doesn't say who owns the domain and the hosting account. If your name isn't on both, you're renting your own front door.
- "Starting at" with no ceiling and no scope. A starting price with no ending price tells you nothing.
- A monthly search engine optimisation (SEO) retainer attached from day one, before the site exists. Labelling your address, hours and services so search engines can read them belongs in the build. The ongoing work is real, and you buy it after you have something to measure.
If your name isn't on both, you're renting your own front door.
Five questions to ask before you pay a deposit
Whoever you hire, me included, these five questions sort the quotes in one phone call. A designer who won't put the answers in an email is telling you something.
- What is the total price, and what would make it change? A number with nothing behind it is a guess.
- Are the words included, or do I write them? If you're writing them, the quote is for design only, and launch waits on your evenings.
- Whose name will the domain and the hosting account be in? The only acceptable answer is yours.
- What does it cost per year to keep the site up, and what exactly is that paying for? You want two small figures, domain and hosting, and nothing vague.
- What happens if I want to add a page next year? You want "we add it to what's there," not "we'd need to rebuild."
Why "it depends" is a stall
Anyone who has built a lot of small sites can give you a range after a twenty-minute conversation. The questions are short. What do you sell? Roughly where? Does anyone pay or book on the site? Do you have the words written already? That is enough to be roughly right, and to say what could change the number.
If somebody can't give you a range after that conversation, either they haven't built many of these, or the vagueness is doing a job for them and not for you.
What the stall costs you is time. A quote you can't read on a page becomes a decision you put off until next spring, and then the spring after.
When you can wait
Some businesses don't need a site this year, and it's fair to say so. If you're a one-person trade, booked out from word of mouth, with a Facebook page that shows current hours and a phone number that rings, you can wait a season. How to tell when the season is over, including a way to count where your customers actually come from, is in the guide to building it yourself or hiring a designer. The table above is where the hire-a-designer side of that decision lands.
Want the number for your own business? Tell me what you sell and which town you're in, and I'll send a fixed price in writing before any work starts. Get a fixed-price quote
Common questions
Can I spread the cost instead of paying it all at once?
Yes. Financing is available on every size: 0% interest over 24 months for qualified clients, so the one-time price can be spread out. Ask when we talk and I'll put the terms in the written quote.
I already own a domain name. Does that change anything?
No, and you keep it. It stays registered in your name and gets pointed at the new site when it launches, so there's nothing to buy twice. If it's currently registered in someone else's name, that's the first thing we fix.
What isn't in the price?
Two things. The yearly renewals for your domain and hosting, which are small and go in writing before you pay anything. And anything after launch, such as paid advertising or ongoing search work, which is only worth buying once there is something to measure.
What if Grow's ten pages aren't enough?
Then Complete is the size, because it's built so pages and services can keep being added without a rebuild. If you're at nine pages and might need twelve, say so up front and I'll quote it that way.
Can I get a quote without a meeting?
Yes, that's the point of the three sizes. Read the table above and pick the size closest to your business; the number in the table is the number, and the written quote confirms it. If the honest answer is "you don't need me yet," I'll say that too.
Prices last updated: September 2026.
Send me what you sell and roughly where, and I'll reply with a size and a number, or with "not yet" if that's the truth. The full breakdown of all three sizes, starting with Starter at $2,500, is on the home page. Email hello@niagarawebdesigner.com or call [905.682.4642](tel:+19056824642).