9 Graphic Design App Success Stories [2024]
A graphic design application is a SaaS application that allows users create online graphics. Examples of graphic design applications include Snappa, adobe Photoshop, and GIMP.
Modern businesses need digital branding, holograms, and poster designs, to maximize the customer reach abilities. Therefore, graphic designers are becoming the most in-demand professionals.
The high demand is a good basis for choosing graphic design applications as one of the best app business ideas in 2022. Before you kick start the graphics design app business idea, here are technical skills you may consider:
- Design principles
- Idea generation
- Branding skills
- Typography
- Print designing
- UX and UI Design
While coding skills and cross-platform development skills are important to start developing applications, you can hire developers online.
In this list, you'll find real-world graphic design app success stories and very profitable examples of starting a graphic design app that makes money.
1. Snappa ($1M/year)
Christopher Gimmer, the co-founder of Snappa, came up with the idea for the business after struggling to create graphics for his blog posts. As he searched for a simple and powerful graphic design tool, he realized there was a need for one geared towards marketers and entrepreneurs. He leveraged his viral blog post about free stock photos to market Snappa and collected feedback from potential users before building the prototype.
How much money it makes: $1M/year
How many people on the team: 4
Learn how two friends bootstrapped a SaaS business to $55k monthly recurring revenue (MRR) by creating a simple graphic design tool for non-designers and focusing on content marketing for customer acquisition.
2. Delesign ($972K/year)
Delesign was founded by Kenny Schumacher to address the need for affordable and high-quality design services that businesses of all sizes could utilize. Through a rigorous vetting and training process, Delesign provides clients with dedicated senior-level designers who can complete graphic design, animation, web and app, UI/UX, and illustration projects with fast turnaround times. The company has seen rapid growth, reaching nearly $100k MRR in just four years, and relies on referrals, organic traffic, and targeted content marketing to attract and retain customers.
How much money it makes: $972K/year
How much did it cost to start: $0
How many people on the team: 55
Delesign's co-owner explains how their fully remote-based graphic design service has scaled to nearly $100k MRR in just 4 years since providing entrepreneurs with a dedicated senior-level designer for a flat monthly rate with extremely fast turnaround times.
3. Plasfy ($180K/year)
The idea for Plasfy, a revolutionary graphic design software, emerged from recognizing the unmet needs and frustrations of graphic designers in the market.
How much money it makes: $180K/year
How much did it cost to start: $500
How many people on the team: 0
Plasfy is a graphic design software that offers a user-friendly platform with powerful features, allowing anyone to unleash their creativity and design eye-catching graphics; the company has gained tremendous traction, with over 200,000 designs created by its users, and has collaborated with freelancers from various countries to develop advanced features and thousands of templates.
4. Designious ($180K/year)
Alex Dumitru, along with his colleagues Viorel Popescu and Ciprian Dragut, started Designious as a side project in 2008. They initially created a website to publish the unused designs from their design studio, and it quickly gained traction, making a few hundred dollars in the first month. Since then, Designious has grown into a profitable business, generating around $12-13k per month, and they are now expanding their product offerings and opening up the platform to other designers.
How much money it makes: $180K/year
How many people on the team: 2
Designious co-founder Alex Dumitru shares how the graphic design library generates $12-13k in monthly revenue by creating digital products that appeal to print-on-demand entrepreneurs and graphic designers, while also offering a flat-rate membership and useful resources that solve little problems.
5. Aucoin Analytics, LLC ($166K/year)
Kervin Aucoin, a 15-year Army veteran and 20+ year Intelligence analyst, came up with the idea for Aucoin Analytics after realizing the need for an unbiased and well-informed travel security platform. Through blogging about his travel experiences and witnessing the detrimental effects of sensationalized news, Kervin developed a subscription-based private intelligence community that focuses on defeating fake news and providing accurate information. With a low overhead, Aucoin Analytics has seen profits of $10,000/month and offers specialized risk assessments and intelligence reports tailored to customers' needs.
How much money it makes: $166K/year
How much did it cost to start: $25K
How many people on the team: 1
Aucoin Analytics, LLC is a private intelligence company that delivers highly specialized risk assessments and intelligence reports, while also offering a subscription-based private intelligence community that provides access to subject matter experts in government intelligence, with profits at $10,000/month.
6. VecRas Creations Pvt. Ltd. ($144K/year)
Spotting a gap in the booming gadget skin market, graphic designer Sunil Aggarwal launched VecRas in 2007 to supply essential digital templates, transforming a $1,000 per month start into a $20,000-$30,000 revenue stream with a nationwide customer base.
How much money it makes: $144K/year
How much did it cost to start: $15K
How many people on the team: 10
Founder Sunil Aggarwal started VecRas in 2007, a digital design company that provides Vinyl Ready Vector cut file templates for skins and Smart PSD mockups for mobile devices, which initially did $1,000 per month and now expects $20,000 - $30,000 per month with customers growing nationwide.
7. MeetAnders ($87.9K/year)
Marilyn Wo, co-founder of MeetAnders, came up with the idea for her productized graphic design company after realizing the limitations of her freelance business. She saw the potential in offering predefined design packages on a subscription model, providing unlimited graphic design for a fixed fee per month. Through trial and error, Marilyn and her team grew the business to a three-person team with $7,000 in monthly recurring revenue, attracting customers such as event directors, CMOs, and startup founders who needed ongoing design support.
How much money it makes: $87.9K/year
How much did it cost to start: $0
How many people on the team: 3
MeetAnders is a productized graphic design company offering unlimited graphic designs for just one fixed-fee a month, with a three-man team and $7,000 in monthly recurring revenue, all started without any upfront capital.
8. Avatoon ($56.4K/year)
Zoltán and his colleagues founded Avatoon.net after realizing the obscure market for custom hand-drawn avatars. They launched their website and attracted customers through an email campaign and ProductHunt feature, and have since focused on improving their SEO to attract organic traffic. With a majority of their clients being returning companies, they plan to spend more on SEO and introduce different art styles at different price points in the future.
How much money it makes: $56.4K/year
How much did it cost to start: $800
How many people on the team: 3
Avatoon.net founders share how they started a $4.7k/month business selling custom hand-drawn avatars and grew to an average of $5,000 per month with ~100 clients through SEO-focused marketing and serving returning companies.
9. SP-Studio ($1.2K/year)
Janina, the founder of SP-Studio.de, came up with the idea for her business in 2002 when she wanted to create a website where anyone could create their own cartoon characters without any drawing skills. Inspired by the TV show South Park, she wanted to offer a tool that was easy to use but also allowed for creative freedom. Through word of mouth and international growth, SP-Studio.de became one of the biggest and most popular avatar creation websites, attracting over 60,000 visitors per day at its height.
How much money it makes: $1.2K/year
How much did it cost to start: $150
How many people on the team: 0
This case study is about Janina, the founder of SP-Studio, a popular website with over 60,000 visitors per day that allows anyone to create unique cartoon characters for free without drawing skills, and how she built the website without focusing on generating revenue for many years.
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Download the report and join our email newsletter packed with business ideas and money-making opportunities, backed by real-life case studies.
Download the report and join our email newsletter packed with business ideas and money-making opportunities, backed by real-life case studies.
Download the report and join our email newsletter packed with business ideas and money-making opportunities, backed by real-life case studies.
Download the report and join our email newsletter packed with business ideas and money-making opportunities, backed by real-life case studies.
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