# Inkwell · Pricing Rationale (Internal) For the operator and buyer of Inkwell. Not for prospects. Why the price, when to discount, when to walk, the LTV math, where Inkwell sits relative to comparable services. --- ## Standard prices - **Solo: $29 / month.** Unlimited contracts. E-signature included. All 50+ templates. One user. - **Agency: $79 / month.** Up to 10 seats. Shared template library. Team approvals. Custom-branded contracts. - **Annual prepay: 15% off either tier.** ### Why $29 for Solo specifically Three anchors: 1. **The freelancer's "no-think" SaaS budget is around $30/month.** Below that, the purchase is impulsive (yes/no in 30 seconds). Above $40, freelancers start comparing to alternatives and decision time stretches by weeks. We chose to live below the comparison threshold. 2. **One avoided lawyer fee covers two years of subscription.** If a freelancer pays $650 for a custom contract once every two years, they have already covered the subscription. The math is so easy it is essentially a non-decision. 3. **It positions us against Bonsai ($25 to $39/mo, freelancer-OS focused) and below LegalZoom Business Advisory ($49+/mo).** Inkwell is more contract-focused than Bonsai and cheaper than LegalZoom. The triangle works. ### Why $79 for Agency Three anchors: 1. **Per-seat math gets prohibitive fast for a 10-person agency.** At $29/seat, a 10-seat agency is $290/mo. The agency tier is deliberately under that to make the team upgrade obvious. 2. **The template library plus shared brand is the agency's actual unlock.** Agencies want the founder's reviewed template applied across all junior account managers. The agency tier is priced to be the right answer for that use case. 3. **It sits below DocuSign Business ($65 to $125/seat) and below Ironclad/PandaDoc enterprise.** Most small agencies are not ready for those. Inkwell is the obvious midpoint. --- ## When to discount ### Annual prepay: 15% off Solo: $295/yr (vs $348). Agency: $805/yr (vs $948). Take it every time. Cuts churn, pulls cash forward. ### Industry-association partnerships Freelancers Union, AIGA, Association of Independent Information Professionals, regional design associations. Negotiated 20% off list for verified active members. The association takes a per-acquisition fee. We pay it gladly because predictable inbound is worth the discount. ### Design-partner agency in a new vertical: 50% off for 6 months Industries we have not yet productized for (legal services, insurance, healthcare-adjacent, government contracting). One per vertical. Recorded case study with metrics is the trade. After 6 months, list price. ### Volume freelancer collective Some collectives (cooperatives, accelerators, freelance unions) want to bulk-buy 50+ seats. We will negotiate to $19/seat at 50+ seats, $15/seat at 200+. The collective handles billing. --- ## When to walk We do not negotiate below $19/mo on Solo. Hard floor. - **Below $19, the support cost eats the margin.** Even self-serve users consume ~12 minutes/month of human handoff in aggregate. At $19 we are still profitable; below that we are not. - **The freelancer who fights $29 will fight every email and threaten to leave when we charge for a feature.** They will be the loudest in support and the first to churn. - **The freelancer who fights $29 cannot afford the next product.** Agency upsell, custom-template service, contract-review premium are all $50 to $200/mo add-ons. Walk-away script: "I understand. The way Inkwell is priced, one avoided lawyer fee covers two years of subscription. If $29 does not feel right, we may not be the right tool yet. Try the free 14-day trial; if it is not obvious, do not pay us." Do not chase. --- ## LTV math ### Assumptions (refresh quarterly) - Solo ARPU: $29/mo = $348/yr. - Agency ARPU: $79/mo = $948/yr. - Annual prepay penetration target: 30% Solo, 45% Agency. - Solo-to-Agency upgrade rate: ~14% within first year. - Blended ARPU after mix: ~$520/yr. - Gross margin: ~85% (LLM inference, e-signature pass-through, ~5 min/mo support per active user). - Monthly churn target: ~3.8% Solo, ~2.2% Agency. - Average customer lifetime at blended ~3.0% monthly churn: ~33 months. ### LTV $520 × 0.85 × (33/12) = **~$1,217 LTV** per customer at blended. That looks small until you remember the agency-converted cohort hits LTV of ~$3,400, and we expect 14% to convert. Tail is meaningful. ### CAC ceiling 3:1 LTV:CAC means we can spend up to ~$405 per customer acquisition. Realistic blended CAC is $40 to $80 (mix of organic, content, association partnerships, paid social). ### Payback period At $520 ARPU and 85% margin, gross profit per customer-year is ~$442. Payback against an $80 CAC is about 2.2 months. Very fast. The Solo tier is profitable in month three; the Agency tier is profitable in month two. --- ## Comparable services | Service | Pricing | What you get | What is missing | |---|---|---|---| | LegalZoom Business Advisory | $49 to $349/mo | Generic templates + advisory | Not contract-first, attorney-call upsell | | Rocket Lawyer | $39.99/mo | Templates + attorney calls | UX is dated, freelancer-specific is thin | | Bonsai | $25 to $39/mo | Freelancer-OS (contracts + invoicing + time) | Contracts are a side-feature, library is shallow | | HelloSign / DocuSign | $20 to $65/mo | E-signature workflow | No template library, no plain-English explainer | | Ironclad / PandaDoc | $400+/mo enterprise | Enterprise CLM | Way too much for a freelancer | | Lawyer fees | $400-$1,200/contract | Custom legal work | Slow, expensive, not always warranted | | Inkwell | $29 to $79/mo | Templates + e-sig + plain-English explainer | (Solo) one user | The cleanest comparison is the plain-English explainer. None of the alternatives generate a client-friendly explanation of the contract. That is the feature that makes the contract get signed faster. --- ## Prices we will revisit - **Q3 2026:** introduce Solo Pro at $49/mo with custom-template upload, advanced redlining, and contract-review premium. - **Q1 2027:** raise Solo to $35 once we have 5,000 paying customers and a 12-month retention cohort. - **Never:** unlimited free tier. 14-day free trial, full features, no credit card. After 14 days, the contracts have either become a habit or they have not.