Campaign Launch Staffing: Contract Creative Teams for Campaign and Product Launches
A contract creative team on KORE1 payroll, billed hourly, built around your launch date and released after it.
KORE1 campaign launch staffing assembles a contract creative and production team for a dated campaign or product launch, from creative project manager and art director to designers, copywriters, producers and motion editors, billed hourly and scaled down after launch.
Last updated: November 3, 2026
The launch date is the one thing that won’t move. Everything else will. When a marketing leader calls me about a launch, the budget is usually approved, the brief is mostly written, and the team is two or three people short of what the plan needs. Sound familiar? A full-time search would wrap up after launch day. So they call about contract.
That’s this page. KORE1 builds the launch team on our own W2 payroll, your people direct the work, and each seat ends when its part of the launch is done. It sits inside our digital and creative staffing practice and runs on the same terms as all KORE1 contract staffing. Want the week-by-week plan first? My guide to staffing a campaign launch with contract creatives has it.
What Launch Team Can KORE1 Assemble?
Six kinds of seat cover most of the launches I see. A creative project manager owns the calendar and the approvals. An art director sets the look. Designers and copywriters make the assets. Add a producer when there’s a shoot, an event or a vendor with a hard date, and bring in motion designers and video editors to cut everything down for every channel you’re launching on.
You may not need all six. Plenty of launches run on three. Some run on two. Each seat has its own page if you want to go deeper, starting with creative project manager staffing and art director staffing, then contract graphic designers, copywriters, and our page on producers and heads of production.
One seat stays on your side of the table. Every time. Whoever owns the brand, the brief and final approval belongs on your payroll, because they answer for the launch long after the contractors have gone. On a product launch that’s often a product marketing manager. Anything with a finish line can be contract.
How Fast Can a Launch Team Start, and in What Order?
Think of a tour loading in. The cases go on the truck in the order the show needs them, not all at once. This is the order I use for a launch sixteen weeks away.
Wave 1Planning
- 1Creative project managerIn 16 weeks before launchRuns about 17 weeks
- 2Art directorIn 16 weeks before launchRuns about 16 weeks
- Brand ownerStays on your payrollNot a contract seat
Wave 2Build
- 3Graphic designersIn 12 weeks before launchRuns 10 to 12 weeks
- 4CopywritersIn 12 weeks before launchRuns 8 to 10 weeks
- 5ProducerIn 10 weeks before launchRuns about 11 weeks
Wave 3Finish
- 6Motion designersIn 6 weeks before launchRuns 6 to 7 weeks
- 7Video editorsIn 5 weeks before launchRuns 5 to 6 weeks
Starting is the fast part. Once a candidate accepts an offer, the median KORE1 contractor works a first shift three days later, across 1,997 contract starts from 2019 to 2026, which tells you the clock that matters on a launch is the search and not the paperwork. That figure counts every function KORE1 staffs, not creative alone.
Finding the right person takes longer, so open the searches for cases one and two about a month before you need them on the calendar. Short on time? Load waves one and two together. Eight weeks out with no team happens constantly, and it’s workable. Really.
3 days
median wait from accepted offer to first shift, over 1,997 KORE1 contract starts
116 days
median ended KORE1 contract assignment, over 1,887, against 112 days in a sixteen-week launch
44 to 227
days, the middle half of those assignments, from the 25th to the 75th percentile
207 of 552
KORE1 contract-to-hire placements converted to the client’s payroll, about 37.5%
KORE1 engagement data for hires dated 2019 to 2026, the records behind the Contract Rate Index 2026-Q4, as of October 2026. The figures cover every function KORE1 staffs. KORE1 has too few creative and marketing assignments on their own to publish a creative-only number.
What Happens to a Launch Team After Launch Day?
It gets smaller. Quickly. The finishing seats roll off first, then the build seats, and the project manager and art director go last, once the final files are handed over and the first results are in. You stop paying for a seat when its work ends, and that’s the whole reason to staff a launch by the hour.
Then there’s the person you don’t want to lose. There’s almost always one. Maybe two. Tell us on day one, because a contract-to-hire that’s planned goes better than one that’s improvised, and the contractor deserves to know too.
Watch the hours, though. A KORE1 contractor can move to your payroll with no KORE1 conversion fee after 1,040 hours, and a sixteen-week launch at 40 hours a week comes to just 640, so a launch on its own rarely gets there. If you already know you want to keep your art director, plan a longer engagement before it starts. A seat that should be permanent from the first day belongs in a direct hire search instead. Our post on contract-to-hire for creative roles covers what to watch during the trial.
How Do We Find the Right People for a Launch?
Here’s a search from before I joined KORE1. A fast-growing gaming and consumer beverage brand had just taken on investment, and one seat was holding up everything else, a director of eCommerce they’d been trying to fill for a while. I filled that one first. It grew into roughly six hires in about six months, until a restructuring changed their plans.
Those were full-time searches. Not a launch team. The lessons carry over anyway. Fill the seat that’s blocking everyone else first, and on a launch that’s usually the project manager or the art director, which is exactly why they load first. Expect the plan to change. Theirs did. A contract team can shrink with the plan in a way a room full of permanent hires never can.
So when I screen someone for a launch seat, I ask about the last launch they shipped. Who did they hand the files to? What broke the week before? How did they find out? The answers tell me more than the portfolio does. Every time. The right person answers without blinking.
How Is a Launch Engagement Billed?
By the hour. Simple. You approve the timesheets each week, KORE1 runs payroll and pays the contractor every Friday, and we send you one invoice for the hours worked, while your own team directs the work, sets the priorities and signs off on everything that ships.
It isn’t a fixed fee for a finished campaign. KORE1 doesn’t sell deliverables, we supply the people, and the creative direction stays yours from kickoff to launch day. If a launch grows, add a seat or add hours. Shrinking? End a seat early.
What will it cost? KORE1 hasn’t placed enough contract creatives to publish an observed creative bill rate, and we won’t dress up rates from other functions as creative ones. Our contract creative rates for 2026 are modeled from federal wage data and labeled that way. Count hours first. Two designers and a copywriter for ten weeks at 35 hours a week is 1,050 hours, and that’s the shape of the spend before any rate goes on it. Then ask any firm you talk to what sits inside the hourly rate.
For the federal picture on these seats, the Bureau of Labor Statistics profiles for art directors, graphic designers, writers and authors, special effects artists and animators, and producers and directors describe the work and the pay.
What Does KORE1 Commit to on a Contract?
Four things you can hold us to, and one thing we don’t offer. A short list we keep beats a long one we can’t.
Reliability
Contractors show up on time
Your launch contractor is there on the first morning and on schedule after that.
Get the first week readyPayroll
Paid every Friday
KORE1 is the W2 employer and pays your contractors weekly, so you never run their payroll.
How contract staffing worksConversion
No fee after 1,040 hours
Past 1,040 hours a contractor can join your payroll with no KORE1 conversion fee.
Conversion, explainedFlexibility
Seats end when the work does
Each assignment ends with its part of the launch, and any one of them can be extended.
Deciding on an extension
Devin Hornick, a KORE1 partner, put the appeal plainly on a call with our team. “You can get them quick… flexible… to scale up, to scale down as needed.” That’s a launch. Exactly.
What we don’t offer is a replacement guarantee. There isn’t one on contract, and we won’t imply one. If a guarantee matters more to you than flexibility, direct hire carries one, with a fee of 20% of base salary and a 60-day guarantee. On a contract, the best retention plan is how the contractor is treated, so a clear brief on the first morning, fast feedback on the first round and a straight answer about what happens after launch will do more to keep good people than any clause could.
Common Questions
How far ahead of a launch should we call?
Call about four months out if you can, so the project manager and art director can be found and start sixteen weeks before launch. Eight weeks out still works. We load the planning and build seats together and keep the plan tight.
Can you staff the whole launch team, or just one seat?
Either one. Plenty of launches need a single art director or producer for ten weeks, and others need six or seven people. Tell us the seats you think you need, and we’ll tell you honestly if we’d cut any.
What does a contract creative cost?
KORE1 doesn’t publish an observed creative bill rate yet, because we haven’t placed enough contract creatives to publish one honestly. Our 2026 contract creative rates are modeled from federal wage data and labeled as estimates. The real cost depends on the seat, the level and the hours.
Do launch contractors work onsite or remote?
Shoots and events need people in the room, and most other launch work runs fine remote or hybrid. Tell us the location when you call, because it changes where we look. The contractor is on KORE1 W2 payroll either way.
Can we keep someone after the launch?
Yes, and say so on day one so it’s planned. After 1,040 hours a contractor can join your payroll with no KORE1 conversion fee. Before that, our standard agreement charges a fee that steps down as hours build.
Let’s Talk About Your Launch
Send the launch date, the seats you think you need, how long each one runs, the weekly hours and where the work happens. I’ll tell you what I’d load first.
Let’s Talk About Your Launch →So, how many weeks out are you? You can also find Samantha on LinkedIn.
