WEB DESIGN · PORTLAND, OR
Web Design in Portland That Wins You Customers.
We're Wargo & Wolford — a Portland web design company that builds custom-coded websites for small businesses. No templates, no page builders, no surprise invoices. Fixed fee from $3,500, live in two to six weeks, built to show up when Portland customers search on Google — or ask ChatGPT.
WHY CUSTOM-CODED
Why your site being custom matters (to your revenue, not just your pride)
Most Portland small-business sites are built on templates — Squarespace, Wix, an off-the-shelf WordPress theme. They look fine on day one. Then they load slowly on a phone, blur together with every competitor using the same theme, and quietly lose the Google rankings war to sites that are faster and clearer.
We write every site from scratch. No theme bloat, no plugin stack, no code you'll never use — which is why ours load fast, stay accessible, and give search engines and AI assistants clean, structured information to work with. Most template and page-builder sites ship a pile of code the visitor pays for in load time. We measure every build before launch and show you the numbers.
Speed isn't vanity. It's whether you rank, and whether a visitor stays past three seconds.
WHAT YOU GET
What a project looks like
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Fixed fee, fixed scope. From $3,500 for a sharp five-page site; from $8,500 when you need a CMS, bookings, or integrations; custom builds from $20,000. You get a number before we start, and it doesn't move.
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2–6 weeks to launch, depending on scope.
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Everything included: custom design, SEO and structured data, accessibility, mobile-first build, 30 days of post-launch support.
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You own it all. Code, domain, content — no hostage hosting, no monthly platform ransom.
LOCAL, ACTUALLY
A Portland firm, actually in Portland
A lot of "Portland web design" pages you'll find are templates run by national agencies with no one here. We're two founders in the Portland area — you work with us directly, and you can meet us for coffee to prove it. Our recent work is for real Oregon businesses: a consultant's showcase site, a Central Oregon food brand, a local fuel company.
THE PROCESS
How it works
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Intro call (free). You tell us about the business. We tell you honestly whether you need us — sometimes a template genuinely is enough, and we'll say so.
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Blueprint. Structure and words, agreed before design starts.
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Design + build. You review a real, working preview — not mockups.
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Launch. We handle the technical cutover. Your rankings survive the move.
AUDIT FIRST
Already have a site? Start with the audit
If you're not ready for a rebuild, our Modern Discoverability audit — a full check of how you show up on Google and in AI answers like ChatGPT and Perplexity — starts at $1,500. It shows exactly where your current site stands, with prioritized fixes in plain English and the dollar impact of each. It's the honest first step: sometimes the verdict is "your site is fine, fix these three things," and you keep your money.
FAQ
Questions Portland business owners ask us
How much does a website cost in Portland?
For a custom-built small-business site in Portland, expect $3,000–$10,000 from most quality shops; ours start at $3,500 fixed-fee for a five-page site and $8,500 for sites with a CMS and integrations. Template DIY tools cost less up front but you pay in speed, rankings, and your own weekends. You'll get an exact number from us before any work starts.
How long does a website take to build?
Two to six weeks, depending on scope. A five-page marketing site lands closer to two; a site with a content system, booking, or commerce runs four to six. We work fixed-scope, so the timeline is agreed before we start — not discovered along the way.
Do you use WordPress or templates?
No. Every site is designed and coded from scratch on a modern stack. That's why our sites load fast — there's no theme bloat to fight. We measure performance and accessibility before launch and hand you the report. If a template is honestly the right call for your budget, we'll tell you that on the intro call instead of selling you one.
Will my site show up on Google?
Every site ships with the technical foundation rankings require: fast load times, clean structure, titles and descriptions written for your actual market, and structured data that tells Google exactly what your business does and where. Rankings then grow with reviews and content — we'll show you exactly what moves the needle for your situation.
- What about ChatGPT and AI search?
- This is becoming the question that matters. When someone asks ChatGPT or Google's AI for a recommendation, it pulls from sites structured so machines can read and quote them. Every site we build ships AI-search ready — structured data, direct plain-language answers, machine-readable business facts. It's a standard part of every build, not an add-on.
- Do you work with businesses outside Portland?
- Yes. We're Portland-based and work across Oregon — including Bend and Central Oregon — and remotely with businesses anywhere in the US. Most of our work happens over video calls and shared previews either way, so distance has never been the constraint.
- Can you redesign my existing site instead of starting over?
- Yes — that's a lot of our work. If your current site is slow, dated, or invisible on Google, we rebuild it on a modern foundation and preserve your existing rankings through the migration. You keep your domain, your content, and your search history; you lose the slowness.
- What do I actually own when it's done?
- Everything. The code, the design, the domain, the content. Your site lives on your own accounts, and if we part ways tomorrow, you keep it all with no strings. We think it's strange that this is even a differentiator, but in this industry it is.
- Do you offer ongoing maintenance?
- Optionally, and only for sites we built: our Web Care plan is $750/month for updates, monitoring, and a monthly check-in. It's never required — we build sites your team can run without us, and plenty of clients do exactly that.
- Why hire you instead of a bigger Portland agency?
- Bigger agencies are built for bigger budgets — account managers, longer timelines, recycled playbooks. With us you work directly with the two people doing the work, at a fixed price, on a build that's genuinely custom. If your project truly needs a 20-person agency, we'll tell you that too.
NEXT STEP
Ready when you are
Tell us about the business. First call is free, honest, and pitch-free — sometimes the answer is "you don't need us yet," and we'd rather you hear that from us.