Is it a bad idea for our company to temporarily use a premade website theme?

Question

I work at a software development company as a full time web developer..

In the last year our company has seen massive growth and as a result we've kicked off the rebranding process by getting a proper logo.

As it stands our website is just plain embarrassing! I wrote it when i was just a lowly intern about 2 years ago and every time I see it my stomach turns!

While i'd love to give it some proper TLC i dont really have the time at the moment our company is focussing on client work and building our own product.

Would it be wrong for us to use a ready-made website theme temporarily while we are unable to give it more time?

(remember i'm a web dev.. not a web designer, so it's not exactly like a policeman getting caught stealing! :P )

Answer 1

As an interim solution there's nothing wrong with it strictly speaking, but I would suggest putting some effort into the selection process and finding something that won't immediately get recognized as "that theme I see all the time." A decent-looking pre-built theme is still going to be better than an ugly custom site.

You didn't say how you'd be building the site, but there are frameworks for WordPress and Drupal, for example that have "premium" themes available. They're not terribly expensive most of the time, ranging from about fifty to a few hundred dollars, but they'll be less common simply by virtue of not being free. Many other CMS apps and development frameworks will have similar offerings. A secondary benefit is that if you go with a well-known framework, there will be an existing community for support and even having someone work out a custom look for you.