Slatelock ships a finished artifact on a fixed cadence for the price of the tier. Agency retainers ship whatever hours buy, with month-to-month deliverables buried under a strategy layer. The table below prints the numbers side by side, tier by tier.
The matrix
Each row is a comparison dimension; each column is a vendor. Slatelock columns are productized monthly tiers at a fixed price; the agency columns are typical public retainers at indicative ranges. Toggle a competitor below to isolate one comparison pair on mobile.
Competitor figures ship from a recent benchmark report and are reproduced exactly as published; placeholders are flagged on each row.
Why productized wins
The numbers above are the symptom. The pattern below is why the math usually breaks in the buyer's favor — even before the first deliverable ships.
A Slatelock tier ends every month with the same shipped artifact on the same cadence. Agency retainers bill hours and ship whatever those hours happen to produce; the buyer cannot compare month to month without a relationship.
Slatelock contracts are month-to-month by design. A 12-month agency lock means the buyer keeps paying for an engagement that is not moving numbers; a 6-month lock is shorter but still leaves the buyer carrying sunk cost for half a year.
$890 / 4 articles = $223 / article. $1,490 / 1 rebuild = $1,490 / rebuild. $1,190 / 8–12 changes = $99–$149 / change. Agency retainers quote monthly and then layer "scope" on top; the per-deliverable rate is whatever the agency says it is.
A productized retainer ships once the buyer subscribes. Agencies bill for the intake before the intake is paid for — discovery, strategy, audit, all billed before the first deliverable lands. Slatelock ships the first artifact on a known cadence, not after a custom-scope conversation.
A fixed deliverable, not a fixed invoice
You pick a tier, you pay the listed monthly price, you get the same artifact every month. Cancel before the next renewal. No discovery call, no scope creep, no surprise invoice.