Monthly Retainer
A senior designer on your team.
Without the hiring process.
Hiring a full-time senior product designer takes three to six months — job posts, interviews, notice periods, onboarding. By the time they're up to speed, your roadmap has already shifted.
A retainer gets you dedicated, senior-level design support starting within one week. You set the priorities. I execute. No agency overhead, no junior handoffs, no one explaining your product to a new person every month.
The problem
You don't need another project. You need design that keeps up.
Shipping every week, but design is one-off?
Your team ships continuously — with AI, faster than ever.
A project engagement wraps up; your product doesn't. The mismatch is the delivery model.
Weeks of process before anyone designs anything?
Hiring takes months. Agencies take meetings.
Interviews, proposals, account managers — you're paying for process before you see a single screen.
You've become the design department?
Briefing freelancers, catching drift, judging AI-generated drafts — that's your time now.
Without one person holding the context, every design decision routes through you.
You'll get
One designer. Your pace. No layers.
/ 01
Design that matches your shipping pace
A dedicated senior designer moving with your sprints — week after week, not project by project.
/ 02
Senior-level design, available in a week
Skip the hiring cycle and the agency onboarding. Start getting output within days, not months — with no headcount risk.
/ 03
One person who holds the context
Your product, your users, your brand voice — carried over sprint after sprint, without re-briefing.
/ 04
Judgment, not just screens
Someone to call which version is right — whether it came from Figma or an AI tool — before it ships.
/ 05
Flexible intensity, zero lock-in
Async or Embedded, pause or cancel anytime. Scale support with your stage, not a contract.
/ 06
One designer. No layers.
No account manager translating your feedback, no junior handoffs behind the scenes. You talk directly to the person designing your product — decisions happen in the same conversation, not three emails later.
WHAT MAKES THIS DIFFERENT FROM HIRING
The honest comparison.
Full-time hire
Design agency
Retainer with Guo
Time to start
1–2 months
2–4 weeks
1 week
Monthly cost
USD 8,000–15,000+ (salary + benefits + recruiting)
USD 5,000–20,000+
USD 2,800–3,800
Seniority guaranteed
Depends on hire
Depends on who's assigned
Always me
Direct communication
✓
Often through account manager
✓
SaaS product experience
Depends on hire
Varies
8+ years
Context carryover month to month
✓
Often reset
✓
Pause or cancel
✗
Contracts vary
✓
Two tiers. Same designer. Different intensity.
Async
Ongoing · month-to-month
"I need design moving. I don't have time to manage it."
USD 2,800
approx. NT$ 88,000
/ month
Senior design that keeps moving on its own — no managing, no meetings, fully async. Pause or cancel anytime.
Embedded
Ongoing · month-to-month
"We need design consistently, but we're not ready to hire."
USD 3,800
approx. NT$ 120,000
/ month
The speed and consistency of an in-house designer — without the headcount, the hiring risk, or the long-term commitment. Pause anytime.
Async
Embedded
Collaboration
Live Meeting
-
Bi-weekly
Response channel
Slack (within 1 business day)
Slack (within 3 hrs)
Real-time input
-
✓
Time zone
Any — fully async
GMT+8 primary
Delivery
Turnaround time
2–5 business days
2–3 business days
Design feedback
Figma comments / Loom
Figma / Loom / Live review
Design system
✓
✓
Design contributions
✓
✓
Dev-ready Figma handoff
✓
✓
Terms
Tasks at a time
One
One
Pause or cancel
Anytime
Anytime