Being straight with you is part of the brand. A freelancer is probably the right call when:
- The job is small, one-off, and the deadline is soft
- You have a developer you already trust and they have room on the calendar
- The scope is narrow, like one plugin tweak or one template change
A studio earns its keep when the work is client-facing, on a deadline, spans more than one discipline, or has to keep happening month after month.
It depends on the work. Freelancers are a good fit for small, occasional, low-stakes jobs. A white-label studio is the stronger fit for client-facing builds, tight deadlines, work that spans several disciplines, and pipelines that repeat month after month, because you get a team, a written standard, and continuity instead of one person's calendar.
Often the hourly or project number is higher. The comparison that matters is total cost: the time you spend re-briefing, chasing, testing, and reworking, plus what a missed deadline costs with your client. Blue Marlin quotes a fixed price within 48 hours of your brief, so you know the number before work starts.
Yes. Many agencies use a studio for overflow, migrations, speed fixes, or anything their freelancer doesn't specialize in, and keep their freelancer for everything else.
No. Quotes, staging links, handoff docs, and the accounts the site lives in are all under your agency's name. We don't contact your clients and we don't publish client lists.
You do. Code, documentation, hosting, and licenses are transferred to accounts you own, with full Git history. Nothing is held hostage.
Per-project builds include 30 days of post-launch support. For ongoing coverage, a White-Label Retainer gives you reserved monthly capacity and maintenance across past builds.
Yes. That's what "The Single Catch" is for. One build, fixed scope, fixed quote. Move to a retainer whenever it makes sense.