Pricing
Every engagement gives you two things: a direction, and the momentum to get there. Flat prices: no hourly billing, no expenses on top, no scope creep.
North Star
The strategy. Where you are going, why the category is yours, and the document your whole company can build and sell from.
Momentum
The follow-through. The guidance that turns a strategy into how the team actually works, so it doesn’t end up in a drawer.
Two ways in
Both are small and fast, and the entire fee credits toward a bigger engagement if you book one.
Positioning Stress Test
$8,000 · 10 business days
Can buyers tell you apart? Ten business days to find out.
Done category design work before? We adjust our playbook and run your Stress Test as a Category Check: same price, same timeline, with a review of what you already have and where to go next.
Funding Sprint
$5,000 · 2-3 weeks
Raising your first round. A category frame and an investor narrative, fast.
The strategy
Compass and Beacon include exactly the same work: research and market analysis, interviews, a category frame, narrative and messaging, and your full North Star document. What differs is how we produce it: Beacon does far more of it in person, in the room, where hallway conversations happen and body language carries what a video call throws away.
Compass
Early stage$75,000 · 3–4 weeks
When the product works but the story doesn’t: the full strategy, run remotely. You leave knowing exactly where you are going and why the category is yours to win.
Beacon
Scaling & established$150,000 · 4–6 weeks
When you’re launching something new, or reinventing a brand people already know: we come to you for a week to finish the work, and we leave you with the position others will steer by. We work with your in-house team or agency throughout.
See how they differ, side by side
| Compass | Beacon | |
|---|---|---|
| Where we work | Remotely, start to finish | With you — a full week on site. Travel included. |
| People we interview | Three to seven, remotely | Ten to fifteen, in person wherever we can arrange it |
| Leadership workshop | Working sessions, remote | A full day, everyone in one room |
| Your North Star document | Written remotely, walked through live on a call | Written on site over two days, walked through in person — and again the next morning if you want it |
| Momentum included | 6 months of Coaching (bi-weekly, for you) | 9 months of Groove (weekly, for the work) |
| How long it takes | 3–4 weeks | 4–6 weeks, including the week with you |
| Price | $75,000 | $150,000 |
Who we interview depends on where the story lives: your leadership and board, an early investor, a customer or two, sometimes the founder’s family. We’ll discuss this with you during kick-off.
Beacon: the week we spend with you
- Monday
- A full day in one room with your leadership team, working through what we found.
- Tue – Wed
- We hole up nearby and write your North Star document.
- Thursday
- We present it in person, to the room it was written for.
- Friday
- Debrief, questions, and any changes you want made before we go.
Impact
Beacon, plus a studioCustom quote
When you don’t have an agency or in-house team for the visual work: everything in Beacon, with 9elements bringing the visual identity and the launch. And usually more months of Momentum.
The follow-through
Coaching comes with Compass, Groove with Beacon. What separates all three is what we focus on.
Coaching
For you$8,000 · 3 months · Bi-weekly, remote
Calls about progress and hurdles, and how to think in categories. The work comes up, but you are the point.
Six months included with Compass. Also available on its own.
Groove
For the work$20,000 · 3 months · Weekly, remote
We read what your teams are producing against your North Star, and send it back when it drifts. Whoever is doing the work: comms, product, in-house creative, your agency.
Nine months included with Beacon. Also available on its own.
Residency
For the whole companyBy invitation · Embedded, in person
We take a co-management seat on your leadership team and run the category work from inside the business.
By invitation, after Beacon or Impact. Never bundled.
Find yourself on this list
- You’re raising your first round
- Funding Sprint. The fee counts toward any North Star engagement once you close.
- The product works, the story doesn’t
- Compass, if you don’t need us in the room (or don’t even have one).
- You’re launching or reinventing a brand at scale
- Beacon (or Impact, if you have no agency or in-house team for the visual work).
- Your board or your investors handed you a transformation mandate
- Beacon. Every one of those mandates starts with a North Star you’re assumed to already have. That’s the part we write.
- You have the strategy deck and sales still can’t use it
- The Stress Test, run as a Category Check. We read the deck against how you actually show up to buyers, and tell you where the two came apart.
- You need internal agreement before you can commit
- The Stress Test gives you something concrete to put in front of stakeholders. Pairs well with Coaching.
- You run a smaller local or regional business
- Our North Star engagements are built (and, yes, priced) for companies going after a national or international category. The Stress Test isn’t. It stands on its own at any size, and we’re happy to talk it through.
- You’re an investor or a board member, and it is not your company
- For investors and boards. The same engagements, described from your side of the table.
- You’re genuinely not sure
- The Stress Test is the smallest commitment here, and the entire fee credits forward if you move into a full engagement within 90 days.
If you're still deciding which one is yours:
Let’s talk →