Web Designer for Tradesmen: What One Costs in 2026, and When You Don't Need One

If you searched for a web designer for tradesmen, you are probably in one of two places. Either you have had a quote and want to know whether it is reasonable, or you have decided a proper website means paying someone to make it and you want to find the right person.

Both are sensible. This is a plain account of what hiring a designer involves and costs, and then the honest case for when you do not need one. The designer route is a legitimate choice, and for some trade businesses it is the right one.

What a web designer charges

For a small trade business in the UK, a designer or small agency will typically quote somewhere between £1,000 and £2,500 for a site of five to ten pages. That figure has been stable for years and we are not going to pretend to know your local market better than the three quotes you should get.

What sits behind the number matters more than the number:

• Pages. A designer's quote is usually for a fixed set: home, about, services, gallery, contact. A page for each service and each area you cover, which is what gets a tradesman found for "electrician Poole", is normally extra, per page.
• Words. Many designers expect you to supply the text. If they write it, that is on the quote too.
• Changes after launch. New phone number, new service, a price change. Most designers charge by the hour for this, commonly £50 to £100.
• Hosting and the domain. Yours to pay for, usually £5 to £20 a month for hosting plus the domain each year, unless the designer bundles it.
• Who owns it. Ask. Some agencies host the site on their own account and it is not straightforward to leave.

How long it takes

A realistic timeline, from first contact to a live site:

1. You get in touch, describe what you want, and get a quote. A week, sometimes two.
2. You pay a deposit, usually half.
3. The designer builds a first version. Two to four weeks.
4. You review it and ask for changes. Another week or two, depending on how quickly you both reply.
5. It goes live and you pay the balance.

Four to eight weeks is normal. Longer if you are slow with photos and text, and everybody is slow with photos and text.

What you get for it

A site that looks like yours and nobody else's. That is the real product, and it is worth paying for if it matters to your business.

You also get a person who knows your site. When something needs doing, you email them. That is a relationship, and a good one is valuable.

What you do not automatically get is the plumbing behind a site that brings work in: enquiries that reach your phone while you are on a job, a way to send the quote and get it accepted, invoices with your bank details, a reminder to ask for the review. A designer builds the shop front. Running the shop is still your problem.

When you should hire a designer

• You are a company, not a sole trader. Several vans, an office, staff. Your website is part of a brand and should look like it.
• Your work sells on how it looks. High-end kitchens, bespoke joinery, landscaping with a portfolio. The photographs are the pitch and the site has to carry them properly.
• You need something specific. A booking system, a customer login, a shop. Templates will fight you.
• You have the budget and the time, and you would rather pay once than monthly.

If two or more of those are you, get three quotes and go in with the questions above.

When you don't need one

Most sole traders and small trade firms need something simpler: a site that says what you do and where, shows some photos and reviews, and gets the enquiry to your phone. For that job, paying £1,500 and waiting six weeks is the expensive way round.

MyTradeSite was built for exactly that case. You pick your trade, tick your services, add the areas you cover, and the site is generated for you: a page for each service, a page for each area, about, gallery and contact, fifteen or more pages, written for your trade. You change the colours, logo, photos and any of the words yourself, from your phone.

It is £99 a month, everything included: the site, a free .co.uk domain when you subscribe, lead alerts by text and email, quotes with a tap-to-accept link, invoices with your bank details on them, job costing, your Google reviews shown on your homepage, and the person who built it on WhatsApp if anything is wrong. You see the finished site before you pay, with no card needed.

What you give up is the one thing a designer sells: a look that is only yours. The layout is the layout. If that is a deal-breaker, hire the designer. If what you want is a site that exists and keeps working without you, it is not.

The two side by side

A fair way to decide

Add up the designer's quote, a year of hosting, and an honest guess at changes for the year. Compare that with twelve months of the alternative. Then ask the only question that matters: which one will still be accurate and working in a year, and who will have done the work to keep it that way.

If you want to see what the built-for-trades version actually looks like before deciding, the demo dashboard is open with no signup, and the builder comparison covers Wix, Squarespace and WordPress for the same reader. For the full cost picture across every route, there is a breakdown of what a tradesman website costs.