Press release
12designer.com: one year crowdsourcing Europe
The platform for creative projects as contests celebrates its first birthday stepping forward in its business model
Download press release as PDF 
Berlin, March 4th 2010: At 18:34 on 04.03.2009, 12designer was born. Its first version in German welcomed 30 designers, that have become 5000 creatives. Today, 12designer is one of the European market leaders, and celebrates its anniversary with a present: offering the last 30 days before introduction of fees for premium services.
The inevitable first-twelve-months balance
Eva Missling and 12designer's Team in front of their Wall of Fame for Winning Designs
“It may sound as a cliché, but when 12designer went finally online, after months of work, conceptualization and programming, it wasn't planned to grow as fast as it growed”, says Eva Missling, CEO and platform founder. Facts talk by themselves: more than 700 projects that gave a 230.000€ business volume to the platform; the expansion from one to five languages (German, and Spanish, English, French and Italian afterwards), and the development of platform itself, which turned from a strict graphic and webdesign orientation to a global creative offer where copywriters are able to write texts or create the perfect name for a new product or company. All facts together show the reason why 12designer has become a creative reference in Europe.
Nevertheless, even though 12designer has evolved, classics are still classics. Most demanded category stills being logo creation: 40% of all 12designer's projects are logo-related. Average prize for projects lays in 325€, with a record prize of 3500€ for a Spanish web design. 12designer is consolidated as a first-level communicative option, able to generate 95 naming projects in a short period of time, or to offer 784 design proposals in a logo project for Verne Harnish, one of the entrepreneurs references worldwide.
“Freemium”: 12designer's new model
In its first year launch process, 12designer has been a reference point for the European creative community. A reference free of charge, however. After consolidating the portal in the market, the time has come to monetize the platform. From April onwards, a new model called “Freemium” will be setted; it will combine a “free” usage of the platform (standard projects with limited participation) with a “premium” usage, subject to fees for clients who want to reach the whole 12designer creative community, in a unlimited project or in a private project. In words of Eva Missling, “of course, the possibility of reaching a huge and talented creative community of more than 5000 creatives, could not stay free forever. We do firmly believe that this fee model will be good for everyone, because it will make possible for us to offer new features around our internationalization possibilities and therefore to provide to all our users the best value in service.”
About 12designer
Online marketplace where offers and demands of design work meet. Logos, visitcards, commercial banners, websites: clients post their projects and set a price, designers send their proposals in an open competition and client buys the one he/she likes most. Founder is Eva Missling, and 12designer is the first business developed by Grupo Intercom in Germany. German version was online in March 2009 and Spanish version in June 2009. The 12designer team works in Berlin and Barcelona.
Press contact
Ralph del Valle
12designer GmbH
Schlesische Str. 29-30
10997 Berlin
Tel.: +49 30 60989596-7
E-Mail: press@12designer.com
