What does an AI department really cost?
The honest comparison is not the price of a tool. It is the role you would otherwise create. And that role costs more than the contract says. Whoever needs newsletters, blog posts, social media and presentations every week eventually hires someone. On paper 3,800 euros gross. For the company add employer contributions, holidays, sick leave, onboarding and the laptop. Counted honestly, that is well over 5,000 euros a month for one person with 38 hours who may leave after a year. A department costs 4,800 euros net per month. That includes all workshops and strategy meetings, the machine in your office or cloud compute, hosting, tool licences and API costs. It can be cancelled at any time, and whoever leaves gets everything that was built handed over.
Why the comparison still limps
One person can do one thing at a time. A department with eleven agents can do eleven. But a person can take responsibility, and no agent can. That is exactly why approval stays with you: nothing leaves the building before a human clicks approve.
I asked more than 200 people whether they wanted the full-time role at MyGym. Nobody did. People who truly understand AI leverage do not take a job for 3,000 to 5,000 euros a month. That is no reproach, that is the market.
What came out of three months
From the running mandate
DSB-ONE / MyGym, Salzburg. Agreement of 22 May 2026, status August 2026.
- Eleven agents built, three brands connected
- A dedicated approval platform in production
- Up to 21 automatic checks per draft before a human sees it
- The first blog post was produced fully automatically, with all checks
This note keeps growing
2026-09-02: Calculator added, price set to 4,800 all-in, margin note on the workshop credit.
2026-08-22: Paragraph on the full-time role sharpened after the conversation with Dominik.
2026-08-14: Planted from the case study.