The Truth About Adobe Creative Cloud
I have read a lot lately about the debate on whether Adobe’s Creative Cloud Service is worth it or not. Some argue that they don’t want to have to pay a subscription fee, and there are debates about if it would hurt the company’s sales. I have been using the subscription service for a couple of months now, and I am going to give you the truth about Adobe Creative Cloud.
Adobe Creative Cloud is Good for Business
First off, from a business perspective, the Adobe Creative Cloud service where your apps are available for download online at all times is absolutely wonderful. No matter what machine I am on, as long as I can log into my Adobe account, I can access and download my Adobe CS6 programs at any time. This may definitely come in handy, especially if I had something terrible happen, such as a hard drive crash. I don’t have to keep up with discs, and I have 24/7 access to the programs I need.
Good for the Wallet
Financially, the Adobe Creative Cloud subscription just makes sense. If you do the math, it just makes the entire suite affordable. At the upgrade discount price, with tax I pay roughly $33 per month to have access to the entire Master Collection of programs from Adobe. I also get 20 GB of my own personal storage space for my files and I can host up to 5 websites with my account. To me, there is no downside. Even after the introductory discount price ends and I end up paying $50 per month for access to the Creative Suite, it is still less than I pay for high speed internet access per month. I have spent more on a nice dinner out with my wife than I do per month for a tool that I use for 8-10 hours per day. To me this is simply a reasonable business expense. It is much better than shelling out $2500 at a time for the master collection, and even $1000 for the upgrade price is still steep in comparison. Being a freelance designer, especially at slower times in the year, I don’t always have a spare $1000 lying around. The other aspect that makes sense is that for the subscription price per month, as long as I keep paying it, I will always have the latest software. If they decide to come out with CS7 in two years, all I have to do is simply download it.
Why is Adobe Creative Cloud Offered at Such a Low Price?
My guess is that Adobe offered their subscription service at this price to make it affordable to everyone. They were tired of software piracy, and they were losing millions of dollars per year due to people copying and ripping off their software. Most people can afford $50 per month. College students are less likely to say, ” I just can’t afford $1000, because I am on a ramen noodle budget.” I delivered pizzas in college, and made $50-$100 per night, so if I could stow away one night’s pay, I could pay for the subscription service. This leaves no excuses for not paying for the necessary programs. Financially, Adobe stands much better to make $50 per month from 1,000,000 subscribers than they do to make $1000 from 250,000 people once. (My numbers aren’t factual, but they help to illustrate my point). On one hand Adobe is making 50 million per month, and one the other hand, they only make 250 million over 2 years, until they come out with an upgrade.
Upgrades are More Manageable Financially
They also stand to make more money, because it is much easier on the designers and developers to upgrade. You simply download the newest version and keep paying your subscription fees. You are paying $50 per month anyway, so nothing has changed, you simply get the upgrade. This keeps people from skipping an upgrade. Why not? You are paying for it, but if it were $1000 to upgrade, you or your company may think twice about upgrading. Most people only upgraded Their Creative Suite once every 2-3 versions.
Conclusion
Overall the Adobe Creative Cloud Subscription service is a no-brainer. You always have access to the latest Adobe programs from anywhere, and at any time. The subscription plan makes it affordable for businesses to acquire this essential design and development software, and Adobe makes more money in the long run. More revenue means that they can budget more money into research and development, so each upgrade in theory will be packed full of new features to make our work much easier, and make us more productive. Have you subscribed to the Adobe Creative Cloud service yet? How do you feel about it? Have you run into any problems? Tell your story in the comments below.
