Calligraphers on FreshBooks pay $33/month — $396/year. Over three years, that's $1,329. Nexa is $279 once. Break-even runs about 8.5 months. The median Calligrapher earns $45,000/year, so FreshBooks's annual cost is roughly 0.9% of typical revenue — every year, forever.
That's $1,329 gone. And you don't own anything. Stop paying, lose access.
You're not the only one who's had enough.
Calligraphers face unique challenges: Wedding clients hand over guest lists with wildly inconsistent formatting and misspelled names, and chasing corrections and address fixes eats unbilled hours before a single envelope is addressed. Per-piece pricing collides with the reality that ink-and-nib work has a redo rate, and the spoiled cardstock and re-lettered pieces aren't cleanly accounted for in a flat per-envelope rate. Clients underestimate turnaround, expecting two hundred hand-addressed envelopes in a few days, not realizing the hand can only do so many quality pieces per session before quality drops. Last-minute guest additions and venue-sign or place-card add-ons arrive after the quote, and the scattered late requests are hard to corral into a final invoice. On top of all that, FreshBooks charges $33/month ($396/year) — money that comes directly from your revenue. The median Calligrapher earns $45,000/year. Software at $396/year is a meaningful percentage of that income, every year, forever. And you do not own anything.
Your pointed nibs (Nikko G, Brause) and oblique pen holders is yours. You bought it once. Nexa works the same way — $279 once for invoicing, scheduling, CRM, time tracking, and full accounting. All connected. All offline-capable. You own it like you own your tools.
FreshBooks is just one piece. What else are you losing money on?
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Your exact FreshBooks cost, full stack total, and what switching saves. 10 seconds.
| Feature | FreshBooks | Nexa |
|---|---|---|
| Invoicing | ✓ | ✓ |
| Scheduling | ✗ | ✓ |
| CRM | ✗ | ✓ |
| Time Tracking | ✗ | ✓ |
| Full Accounting | ✗ | ✓ (SIMPL) |
| Task Management | ✗ | ✓ |
| Price | $33/mo forever | $279 once or 3 × $99 |
| 3-Year Cost | $1,329 | $279 |
| Stop paying? | Lose everything | Keep everything forever |
Most calligraphers are fully switched before the weekend.
Go to Settings → Export Data. Download clients, invoices, expenses, and time entries.
15-minute setup. Import your client list and expense categories from CSV.
Run both for 1-2 weeks. Verify invoice history and recurring invoices.
Cancel subscription. Download a final data export for your records.
You start by warming up, a page of drills and a few flourished capitals, because cold hands make ragged hairlines and the thicks-and-thins won't sing. The morning job is two hundred wedding envelopes, so you rule guidelines on a backing sheet, slot it behind each envelope on the lightbox, and begin addressing in walnut ink with a pointed nib. The rhythm matters: ink the nib, lay the line, mind the pressure on the downstrokes for the swells. Every twentieth envelope or so the flow gets gummy and you wipe the nib. Around eleven you hit a name on the list spelled three different ways and an address missing a unit number, so you set those aside to query the client rather than guess. Lunch rests the hand. Afternoon you switch to a place-card batch for the same wedding, smaller pieces, finer nib, and a couple spoil when the ink feathers on a bad card so you redo them. The client texts adding twelve guests and asking about a welcome sign, neither in the original count, so you note them. Late day you let everything dry flat, photograph the finished envelopes for your portfolio, package the dried pieces carefully, and update the tracker with the spoiled-piece redos and the twelve additions so the final invoice matches the real piece count.
Real calligraphers near you who run their business on Nexa — book directly, no platform fee. Are you a calligrapher? Post your business and get found in your area — $2.99 one-time. Or browse every calligrapher on Nexa →
For solo operators and small teams (1-5), yes. Nexa includes invoicing, scheduling, CRM, time tracking, task management, and full accounting. FreshBooks may be better if you have a large team (10+) or need enterprise-specific features.
It's $7.75/month over 3 years. FreshBooks is $33/month — that's $1,329 over 3 years. Which is more? And if you'd rather split it, Nexa is also available as 3 payments of $99.
Yes. Nexa is $279 as a one-time payment, or 3 payments of $99 ($297 total). Either way it's a one-time purchase — no subscription, no recurring fees ever.
30-day money-back guarantee. Full refund. If Nexa doesn't save you $500 in year one, you get every penny back.
Export your data from FreshBooks as CSV, import into Nexa in about 5 minutes.
The average solo operator there spends about $2,040/year on software — and Calligrapher face their own version of that math. MO state licensing requirements apply.
Numbers reflect typical solo operators in the Springfield metro. Your situation will vary.
Specific gaps Calligraphers run into with FreshBooks, and what Nexa does instead.
$1,329 over 3 years. Or $279 once (or 3 × $99). Own your tools.
Get Nexa — $279 Once