The Designer Calculator — The McClain Method

The Designer
Calculator

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Projects

Welcome to
The Designer Calculator

A Tool by The McClain Method

This calculator will help you accurately determine your Creative Fee and Project Fulfillment Fee for any interior design project. You must have a completed scope of work (usually via a client consultation) before entering information. All percentages are entered as plain numbers without the % symbol — for example, enter 6.75 for 6.75%.

You may refer to these fees using your own terminology. Many designers use "Design Fee" in place of Creative Fee and "Project Management Fee" in place of Project Fulfillment Fee. These are simply the titles and concepts taught inside The McClain Method.

How to Use This Calculator

Save your password on first login: When you first open this tool, you'll be asked for a password. Enter it, then check "Remember password on this device" before clicking Enter. This saves the password to your browser so you never have to enter it again on that device. The password is shared access to the tool — it is not a personal account password and cannot be changed by you. Keep it somewhere safe (your confirmation email is a good place) in case you ever need it on a new device. If team members in your office use the tool, each person logs in on their own device. Everyone gets in with the same password, but each person's projects and data stay private to their own browser. Nobody shares a workspace.

Settings tab: Enter your Hourly Creative (Design) Fee, Sales Tax on Services, Sales Tax on Tangible Products, Freight/Shipping rate, and Hourly Project Fulfillment Fee. All calculations throughout the tool pull from these values.

Task Library tab: Review each task listed under every room type. Based on your experience and past projects, update the time in hours it takes YOU personally to complete each task. These are your numbers — calibrate them honestly.

Scope of Work tab: For each room in your project, enter the quantity of each item you will be selecting or designing. The fee calculates automatically based on your time entries in the Task Library. Leave tasks at zero if they are not part of your scope.

Totals tab: After entering all room quantities, your complete fee breakdown appears here automatically — Creative Fee, Project Fulfillment Fee, tax, shipping, product investment, and your total client investment figure.

Project Fulfillment: The default calculation is 30% of your Creative Fee. If you prefer to bill Project Fulfillment hourly instead, disregard that total on the Totals tab and invoice separately using your Hourly Project Fulfillment (Management) Fee from Settings.

Presentations: On the Totals tab, enter the number of anticipated presentations and your per-presentation fee. This is added to your total client investment.

Product Investment & Shipping: Enter the client's anticipated product budget and the tool will calculate freight/shipping automatically based on your rate. Enter any home measurement company costs as a fixed amount.

Export PDF: On the Totals tab, click the Export PDF button and choose Summary or Full Detail. Click Generate PDF and your browser's print dialog will open. Before saving, do two things: (1) Change the destination to Save as PDF, and (2) uncheck Headers and footers in the print options — this removes the date, time, and URL that the browser adds by default. Then click Save. Before exporting, fill in your project details on the Customize tab for a polished, professional output.

Custom tasks: Each room in the Task Library has an Add row at the bottom. You can add your own custom tasks with your own time estimates at any time. These will appear immediately in the Scope of Work for that room.

Projects — saving your work: The tool saves your work automatically as you go. You will see a small green dot flash in the top bar each time a save happens — no manual saving needed. Your project data is stored in your browser and will be there the next time you open the tool, even after closing it or restarting your computer.

Multiple projects: The Projects bar at the top of the screen lets you work on multiple client projects at once. Click + New Project to start a fresh scope while keeping your previous work intact. Your settings and task library times carry over to every project — only the scope quantities and client details start fresh. Click any project chip to switch between them. To remove a project, click the × on its chip. Note: projects are saved to your specific browser on your specific device. If a team member uses the tool on their own computer, they will have their own separate workspace and cannot see your projects. This is by design — each person's work is private to their own device.

Important Notes

Only edit time values in the Task Library. Do not alter the rate fields unless you are intentionally updating your pricing in the Settings tab.

The buffer multiplier shown on the Totals tab is adjustable in Settings. The default is 1.2x — adding 20% to your Creative Fee to cover any underestimated design time. You can raise or lower it based on project complexity or your own experience.

Sales tax on services is only required in certain states. Check with your local tax authority. Enter 0 if it does not apply to your area.

License & Terms of Use ▼

By purchasing and downloading The Designer Calculator™, you agree to the following terms and conditions, as well as those found at www.mcclainmethod.com.

Access Monitoring Notice: Use of The Designer Calculator is tied to a single-use license. Access activity is monitored. Unauthorized use by non-purchasers, password sharing outside your licensed office, or any form of redistribution is a violation of your license agreement and may result in immediate access revocation without refund.

You MAY:

Use this digital resource for your single-use business purpose.
Use this digital resource with your office and team members.

You may NOT:

Resell, redistribute, or share The Designer Calculator as-is or in any form or manner where the resource can be extracted, including alterations, editing, creating copies, or any iterations whatsoever.
Share the access password or URL with anyone outside your licensed office. Each team member within your firm may use the tool independently on their own device. A single-use license is valid for one company or person only. Each individual firm requires their own license. If you know someone who would benefit from this resource, please direct them to mcclainmethod.com to purchase their own copy.
Profit from this resource. If you can obtain any currency (real or virtual) by your actions with this product, you are using it in a commercial manner, which is prohibited by this license. For commercial licensing inquiries, please contact us.
Claim copyrights to the resources. For questions about this policy, contact [email protected].

Your Rate Settings

Enter your rates once. All calculations pull from these values throughout the tool.

Hourly Creative Fee

Your design hourly rate

Project Fulfillment %

Added on top of Creative Fee total

Sales Tax on Services

Enter 0 if not applicable in your area

Sales Tax on Products

Tangible goods only

Hourly Project Fulfillment (Management) Fee

Used if billing PM hourly instead of %

Freight / Shipping Rate

Average % of product investment

Design Time Buffer Multiplier

Applied to your Creative Fee on the Totals tab as a safety buffer. Default is 1.2 (adds 20%). Set to 1.0 to disable.

Reminder: Percentages are entered as plain numbers. 6.75% = 6.75. 2% = 2. Do not include the % symbol. Sales tax on services only applies in certain states — check with your local tax authority if you are unsure.

Your Access Password

For your use on your own device. Each team member logs in separately on their own device and manages their own projects independently.

Remembered on this device

Creative Fee by Room

Additional Project Details

Anticipated Presentations

Presentation Fee Each

Client Product Investment

Home Measurement Company

Total Square Feet of Areas Serviced

Project Fulfillment — Hourly Override Optional: if you bill PF hourly rather than as a percentage, enter your total PF hours here. This will calculate your PF fee using your Hourly PF rate from Settings and override the percentage method.

Fee Summary

Customize Your Output

These details appear on your PDF export. None of this affects the fee calculation.

Your Firm

Firm / Designer Name

Your Logo

Click to upload your logo

Project Details

Client Name

Project Address

Project Photo

Click to upload a project photo

Fee Label Customization

Creative Fee Label e.g. Design Fee, Creative Fee

Project Fulfillment Label e.g. Project Management Fee

Designer Contact Information

Appears in the footer of your exported PDF.

Phone Number

Email Address

Website

Instagram

Notes / Exclusions

Appears at the bottom of your PDF export.

PDF Line Item Defaults

Choose which fee lines appear on your PDF by default. You can override these each time you export.