I live and work in New Orleans. I run a tiny beignet pop-up and help a jazz camp on weekends. Last year I hired three local web design teams. I wanted sites that felt like home—street brass, bold colors, and clean code. I wanted forms that worked. I wanted someone who would call me back.
If you’re curious how another business owner navigated the scene, this breakdown of hiring three New Orleans web design teams spells it out in detail.
You know what? I got three very different rides.
The short and sweet
- Get Online NOLA built my beignet site in WordPress. It looks fun, loads fast, and takes orders. Our calls went up about 30%.
- Southleft rebuilt our jazz camp site in Webflow. Smooth as butter. Donations no longer break. Parents can find dates without texting me at 10 p.m.
- Online Optimism handled our SEO and content. Fewer dead pages. More people find us on Google. Not flashy—just steady and helpful.
Now let me explain how it felt, step by step.
Beignets and bright buttons: Get Online NOLA
I hired Get Online NOLA for my pop-up bakery site. I wanted bold, but not loud. Mardi Gras colors, but not tacky. They got it. Curious who they are? You can check out Get Online NOLA for yourself.
We met on a Tuesday near the French Market. They brought mood boards in Figma and a short list of pages: Home, Menu, Order, About, and Contact. I liked that they didn’t try to sell me twenty things at once.
- Platform: WordPress
- Timeline: 6 weeks from kickoff to launch
- Cost: $6,800 (site build, basic SEO setup, and training)
- Tools: Yoast SEO, Gravity Forms, Square for payments, WP Rocket, Cloudflare
- Hosting: WP Engine (they set it up; I pay the monthly fee)
Real wins:
- They shot photos of our powdered sugar mess. You can almost taste it. The gallery pops without dragging load time.
- The Order page takes Square. No more “Can I Venmo?” Dings roll in during lunch.
- Mobile speed score went from “ugh” to 90+ on my phone. My old site crawled like a parade float stuck on St. Charles.
We also did little things that saved me later:
- Alt text on photos. Color contrast that passes ADA checks. Big thumbs-up for folks who use screen readers.
- A “weather note” banner I can flip on during storm days. This is New Orleans. Power goes out. People still want beignets.
What I didn’t love:
- Their calendar booking add-on felt clunky. We dropped it and used Calendly with a simple embed.
- The first menu design had tiny prices. Cute, but hard to read. They fixed it fast.
Bottom line: fun, fast, local, and not fussy. The site feels like a second line—bright, clear, and keeps moving.
The jazz camp site that finally makes sense: Southleft
Our jazz camp site was a mess. Old WordPress. Plugins fighting. Donation form broke every third Sunday. Parents kept calling me at night. I was tired. If you’re wondering about their approach, visit Southleft to see their work.
Southleft rebuilt it in Webflow, and I’m not kidding, I slept better.
- Platform: Webflow
- Timeline: 9 weeks
- Cost: $12,300 (design, build, a few custom CMS collections, and training)
- Integrations: Stripe for donations, Eventbrite embeds for showcases, Google Calendar sync, Mailchimp
Real changes you can feel:
- We added a Scholarships page with a simple form. It sends files to Google Drive and emails our director. No more “Did it send?” panic.
- The Events page shows camp dates by age group. It’s color-coded. Parents stop asking me, “Wait, which week is brass?”
- We set up bilingual content (English/Spanish) for key pages. My neighbor cried a little when she saw that. Me too, kind of.
The part that surprised me:
- Webflow updates are easier than I thought. I can swap a teacher’s bio in two clicks. No plugin tantrums.
- They gave us a style guide we actually use. Fonts, buttons, spacing—no guessing.
What bugged me:
- The Webflow plan fees feel high when you’re a nonprofit counting pennies.
- I miss WordPress for blog drafts. Webflow’s editor is fine, just… different.
Results: Donations of $20–$50 now come through steady, not in bursts. Page views went up, but more important, questions went down. Fewer late-night texts. That’s gold.
Not a rebuild—just found by Google: Online Optimism
Online Optimism didn’t design. They tuned. Honestly, that’s what we needed next.
- Scope: SEO cleanup, content plan, analytics setup
- Timeline: 4 months retainer
- Cost: $2,000 per month
- Tools: Google Analytics 4, Search Console, local listings, schema markup, Hotjar
What changed:
- They fixed broken links and title tags that made no sense. Simple stuff. But I never had time.
- We wrote four clear posts: “Best Time To Visit Jazz Camp,” “What To Pack,” “Financial Aid Guide,” and “New Orleans Music Teacher List.” We kept it helpful, not sales-y.
- They tweaked our Google Business Profile. Better photos. Real hours. Fewer “Are you open?” calls on Parade Day.
Numbers I can feel:
- Calls from Google went up about 25% in month three.
- The jazz camp homepage loads faster on mobile. It’s not rocket science—just fewer heavy files.
What I wanted more of:
- A clearer monthly scorecard. They sent data, but I like plain talk. They adjusted after I said that.
Would I hire them again? Yes. For steady care and real-world wins.
A quick look at Deep Fried
We almost hired Deep Fried for a brand refresh. Their mood boards felt like Magazine Street at golden hour—clean, warm, a little bold. We paused for budget reasons. But their discovery call was sharp. If you need heavy brand work plus a site, they’re worth a chat.
Little lessons I learned the hard way
- Ask for hurricane plans. Seriously. Backups matter when the lights blink.
- Agree on page count and features on day one. Add later if you must.
- Pick photos that feel like here. Brass bands. Oak trees. Not stock smiles from who-knows-where.
- Decide who owns hosting and domains. Keep the keys. Email logins too.
- Set a go-live date that doesn’t land on Jazz Fest. Or king cake week. Trust me.
Outside Louisiana, the challenges aren’t much different. For example, a colleague in Texas documented what happened when he hired four web design companies in San Antonio—worth a read if you want another regional perspective.
WordPress or Webflow or… something else?
- WordPress: best when you need lots of plugins, blogs, or e-commerce. Needs care but grows with you.
- Webflow: looks crisp, edits fast, fewer updates to wrangle. Great for clean marketing sites.
- Shopify: if your shop is the star and you sell more than a few items a day.
For the beignet pop-up, WordPress made sense with Square. For the jazz camp, Webflow kept us sane.
Side note: Not every online goal requires hiring a full design crew. Sometimes you just want to connect with nearby adults after the parades wind down instead of spinning up a new site from scratch. In that case, you could hop onto the Adult Finder on FuckLocal—it lets you browse local matches, chat securely, and set up meet-ups without any tech headaches, giving you a fast, mobile-friendly way to meet people right in your neighborhood.
Likewise, if you find yourself cruising through California’s Central Valley and want the inside scoop on massage spots before you book, this guide to Rubmaps in Lathrop breaks down real-user reviews, price ranges, and exact locations so you can decide quickly and skip the guesswork.
Who I’d call for what
- Small food spot or pop-up: Get Online NOLA. They get “fun but clear.” They work well with Square and WordPress.
- Nonprofit or school: Southleft. Webflow builds that cut stress. Forms that send. Calendars that behave.
- Already have a site but can’t get found: Online Optimism. Clean up your SEO. Write helpful posts. Keep it simple.
- Want a single crew that can handle both sleek design and smart SEO? 2 Experts Design is worth a look.
And if you need a brand glow-up with your site? Deep Fried is a solid maybe, budget allowing.
And if you’re on the West Coast, this story about hiring three Portland web design teams shows