If you are picking software for a design subscription, it comes down to five jobs: a request queue, a design tool, recurring payment, automation and video. This page prices three real stacks, solo on free tools, solo with a portal and a six-person studio, starting at $16 a month. That figure is before your website and payment fees, and each tool below comes with what it does for a subscription studio.
Most write-ups of this stack come from the tool vendors and skip the prices. Every price here comes from the vendor's own pricing page, billed monthly unless we say otherwise. The software library has a shorter summary table; this page is the one to send when someone asks what they need and what it costs.
What DesignJoy ran on, and what still holds
If you searched for the DesignJoy stack, the best source is Brett Williams's own account. He gave it in an Indie Hackers AMA in May 2021. He named Trello for requests, Airtable fed by an IFTTT integration, Webflow for the site, Memberstack for logins, Slack, and Shutterstock at about $1,000 a year. At the time he reported 30+ clients and $50k to $60k in monthly recurring revenue, finishing 12 to 13 requests a day. That thread is five years old, so treat it as history, not a shopping list.
Today's evidence is thinner but consistent. The DesignJoy homepage says most requests are designed in Figma and lists Webflow development in the $4,995 a month offer. A 2025 podcast recap written by a third party, not by Brett, says clients request one thing at a time through Trello. In a 2022 post he said he moved from Sketch to Figma while running the business. We cannot tell you what else he pays for now, and nobody outside the business can.
One correction worth making: a competitor page describes Memberstack as discontinued. It is not. The Memberstack pricing page was live with current plans when we checked in September 2026, from $29 a month on Basic.
What holds from 2021 is the shape. One board that clients can see, one design tool, a website that sells the plan, and card payments that renew by themselves. What has changed is that you no longer need to glue Airtable and Memberstack together to get a client login. A portal product does that in one bill, which is Stack B below.
Stack A: one person on mostly free tools
This is the DesignJoy-style setup for Marcus: one designer, a few clients, a board and a Figma seat. It costs $16 a month in fixed software before your website and payment fees.
| Job | Tool and plan | Working | Monthly |
|---|---|---|---|
| Request queue | Trello Free | 1 Workspace, up to 10 collaborators | $0 |
| Design | Figma Professional, 1 full seat | 1 × $16 | $16 |
| Video walkthroughs | Loom Starter | free plan | $0 |
| Automation | Make Free | 1,000 operations a month | $0 |
| Website | Webflow site plan | price not verified | not counted |
| Payments | Stripe with Stripe Billing | percentage per charge, see below | not counted |
| Fixed software total | $16 | ||
Trello Free gives you boards for up to 10 collaborators per Workspace at $0 (Trello pricing). One list per stage, one card per request, and the client sees where their card sits. If you are choosing between boards, our Trello, Notion and ClickUp comparison for a request queue goes further.
Figma Professional shows $16 a month for a full seat (Figma pricing). The page did not make clear whether that default figure is the monthly or annual rate, so leave a few dollars of headroom. Figma also says that on a paid plan others can view and comment on your files without buying extra seats, which covers client feedback.
Loom Starter is $0 (Loom pricing). A two-minute video explaining a design choice saves a round of written revisions.
Make Free gives you 1,000 operations a month at $0 (Make pricing). That is enough to post a Trello card when a Stripe payment succeeds and to ping you when a client adds a request.
Webflow is where DesignJoy sells its plan. We could not verify Webflow's site plan prices in September 2026, so we have left it out of the total rather than guess. Stripe has no monthly fee on its standard tier; you pay per charge, covered in the hidden costs section below.
Stack B: one person with a client portal
If a client has asked "where is my request?" twice in a week, a portal is the fix. It replaces the Trello board with a branded login where clients submit requests, see status and download files. You keep Figma, Loom and Make.
| Line | With Zendo Core | With ManyRequests Core |
|---|---|---|
| Portal and queue | $29 (1 internal user included) | $59 (1 seat included) |
| Figma Professional, 1 full seat | $16 | $16 |
| Loom Starter | $0 | $0 |
| Make Free | $0 | $0 |
| Fixed software total | $29 + $16 = $45 | $59 + $16 = $75 |
Zendo Core is $29 a month with one internal user; extra users are $8 each (Zendo pricing). Zendo also has a free Essential plan for up to 3 clients and 1 published service, which is enough to run your first subscription clients before paying anything. Invoices and payment requests go through Stripe or bank transfer.
ManyRequests Core is $59 a month with one seat; extra seats are $20 (ManyRequests pricing). It includes request forms, queue views, proofing comments on design and video, and recurring billing, so it can also replace the Memberstack login that the 2021 stack needed.
The extra cost over Stack A is $29 or $59 a month. Both offer a 14-day trial with no card, so you can run a real client through one before you pay. Our client portal comparison covers the rest of the field.
Stack C: a six-person studio
This is Dana's studio: six people, Trello, Slack, Stripe and Google Drive. At six people, seat prices decide the bill. Every per-user tool multiplies by six, while flat-priced tools like Zapier do not.
| Job | Tool and plan | Working | Monthly |
|---|---|---|---|
| Request queue | Trello Standard | 6 × $6 | $36 |
| Design | Figma Professional, full seats | 6 × $16 | $96 |
| Automation | Zapier Professional, 750 tasks | flat | $29.99 |
| Core total | $161.99 | ||
| Video (optional) | Loom Business | 6 × $18 | $108 |
| Core plus Loom Business | $269.99 | ||
| Portal (optional, replaces Trello) | ManyRequests Pro plus 5 extra seats | $99 + 5 × $30 = $249 | $161.99 − $36 + $249 = $374.99 |
| Portal (optional, replaces Trello) | Wayfront Pro, 10 seats included | $299 | $161.99 − $36 + $299 = $424.99 |
Trello Standard is $6 per user a month billed monthly, or $5 billed annually (Trello pricing). You outgrow Free here because Standard is priced per user and six staff plus client logins pass 10 collaborators quickly.
Figma at $16 per full seat is the biggest line at $96. Not everyone needs a full seat. Figma lists a Collab seat at $3 for people who only view and comment. A producer or account lead can sit on that cheaper seat.
Zapier Professional starts at $29.99 a month for 750 tasks and one user (Zapier pricing). Its Team plan starts at $103.50 for 2,000 tasks and up to 25 users, which you only need if several people build automations. Make's Core plan at $9 a month for 10,000 operations (Make pricing) is the cheaper alternative if you are happy in its editor. Make's page did not make clear whether $9 is the monthly or annual rate, so allow a little headroom. See our automation tools page before choosing.
Loom Business is $18 per user a month. It is optional because Starter is free; pay for Business only if the free plan's limits get in the way.
The portal lines replace Trello, not add to it. ManyRequests Pro is $99 with one seat included and $30 per extra seat billed monthly, so six people cost $249 (ManyRequests pricing). Wayfront Base is $129 a month with 5 team seats, and Pro is $299 with 10 seats (Wayfront pricing). Wayfront only publishes an extra-seat price for Pro, so a sixth seat on Base is unpriced. If all six need a login, budget for Pro; if one person never touches client work, Base at $129 brings the total to $254.99. For the difference between a portal and a full agency platform, read our agency platform guide.
Slack and Google Workspace sit outside these totals. Slack's Pro plan showed €8.25 per user billed monthly (about $9.39) when we checked in September 2026 (Slack pricing). That page was running a 50% off promotion, so expect the full price to be higher. At that rate, six seats would run about €49.50 a month (about $56.36). We could not verify Google Workspace prices, so they are not counted.
The chart below adds one size between Stack A and Stack C. A three-person studio on Trello Standard and Figma Professional pays 3 × $6 + 3 × $16 = $66 a month for those two lines. That is before any automation, video or portal.
The costs that are not on the pricing page
Payment fees on a $3,995 plan
If Marcus bills one client $3,995 a month through Stripe Billing, the pay-as-you-go fee is 0.7% of billing volume. That is $27.97 a month per client (Stripe Billing pricing). Ten clients at $3,995 is $39,950 of billing volume, so the Billing fee comes to $279.65 a month.
The card processing fee is charged on top, and we could not confirm Stripe's US card rate: every US pricing page we tried redirected to the European one. So take this as a separate example, for a client you bill in euros rather than Marcus's dollar plan. On Stripe's European page a domestic card costs 1.5% + €0.25 (Stripe pricing). A client paying €3,995 a month would carry a card fee of €60.18 (about $68.51). Check Stripe's page for your own country before you set prices.
Memberstack adds its own transaction fee on top of Stripe's. It is 4% on Basic, 2% on Professional, 0.9% on Business and none on the $499 a month Established plan. Those rates come from the Memberstack pricing page. On $3,995 that is $159.80, $79.90 or $35.96 a month per client. If you copy the 2021 stack, that fee can cost more than every other tool combined. Our billing and subscription tools page compares the options.
How tools count a client's logins
The DesignJoy homepage lists "Up to 2 users" on its $4,995 a month plan. If you offer the same, then on Trello Free, five clients with two logins each plus you is 11 people, one over the 10-collaborator limit. Figma lets clients view and comment for free on a paid plan. Portals differ: ManyRequests and Zendo charge for your team's seats. Wayfront advertises unlimited clients for one monthly price on its pricing page. Check how each tool counts a client before you invite one.
The weekend it takes to set up a portal
Judge cost as more than subscription charges. Include configuration, staff administration, client learning, duplicate entry and the effort required to leave. A portal that takes you a weekend to set up costs that weekend at your day rate, and a Zapier automation that breaks silently costs a missed request.
Can you get your requests and files back out?
Before you commit, find the export button and try it. Can you get requests, comments and files out, with the links between them? An exported list of links is not a usable archive if the linked assets become inaccessible. Keep final files in storage you own, such as your Google Drive, not only inside the portal.
Before you commit to any of these
Run this rehearsal in a trial account before you move a paying client.
- Write down what would rule a tool out, using the software evaluation and migration worksheet. For example: clients cannot see status without a paid seat.
- Create a fake client, submit an incomplete brief, then make it ready and start work under your one-active-request rule. Our guide to requests and delivery sets out the rules to test.
- Change a priority, leave conflicting feedback on a file, and approve one specific version. Check what the client sees and what your team sees.
- Pause and restart a subscription in Stripe's test mode, then export everything and check that requests, files and approvals still connect. The billing and retention guide covers what pausing should do to the queue.
If a tool fails step one or four, keep your current stack. Cheaper is not the test. The stack that answers "what is in progress?" without anyone asking in Slack is the one to pay for.