Ask HN: $500k revenue business – Shopify vs. Custom website?

[jimmygatz]

Hi HN,

I run an e-commerce business which now turns over ~$500,000/year. It was initially built on Shopify but I am currently looking to invest some money into rebuilding the website and am considering all my options.

I assumed it would be cheaper in the long-term to invest in having it custom made, but with the new Shopify online processing fees it seems this is not the case.[1] Shopify payment fees are 1.8% + 20p compared to Paypal which is 2.9% + 30p and Stripe which is similar. Even with the unlimited Shopify plan which works out at $2148 a year it's still cheaper for me to use Shopify as I save ~$5000 on online processing fees.

My questions are:

1. If Shopify payment fees are nearly 1% lower than Paypal/Stripe, why does anyone still build their own custom website outside the Shopify platform? Is there some kind of catch I'm missing?

2. Are there any other platforms I should be considering building my website on?

Would really appreciate any thoughts or feedback you might have. If you need any more information please ask and I'll be happy to answer.

Thanks in advance for your time,

[1] https://www.shopify.co.uk/pricing

[jonah]

Well before that volume of sales, people generally set up a merchant account and use a payment processing gateway like Braintree or Authorize.net instead of one of these intermediated systems. You can then negotiate your rates down below what Shopify+ charges. (You can also configure your own gateway with Shopify. Here is a list of the ones supported in the UK: https://www.shopify.com/payment-gateways/united-kingdom )

It really depends on the needs of your business. Does the hosted solution do everything you need it to? Are you hampered by a lack of features or flexibility? How complex are your product offerings, and content management and marketing needs? What are your growth projections? These types of questions should have a larger influence on your decision than transaction fees.

If you want to build your own site, check out SpreeCommerce (Rails) - https://spreecommerce.com/ and ReactionCommerce (Node/Meteor) - https://reactioncommerce.com/

Don't hesitate to add more detail or ask me more questions here or offline - I deal with this stuff all day.

[warewolf]

First, Congrats on $500k+ that's not easily done. I have a Ecommerce I started that makes $200k+/year. As of last year I gave my brother the CEO title. I still own my shares and have my seat on the board.

Right now the company is going threw some similar changes as you. We have decided based on feedback to do a Rebrand. Along with creating a new site. The first site was originally build using Bigcartel. We are still conducting research on what platform we will use but we are certain we will not create a completely custom site.

Simple explanation our company is not a tech startup, its a product company. So we want/need simple maintenance that our team can handle which a platform like Shopify, Squarespace, Bigcartel etc provides. My reason? I've experienced several problems in the past with maintaining a custom site.

The questions we are asking are asking our self, may be something you want to ask yourself as well before you build a new site.

What's our reason for wanting to rebuild the site? Are we seeing loss in sales? How long will it take to build? What do our customers need, that they aren't getting from our site now?

So far we are leaning towards Shopify over squarespace. The only payment option on ss is stripe and all though we love the advance tech stripe is building the rates are to high.

[faramarz]

Have you looked at Shopify Plus? Maybe reach a rep at the company for more info, but from the looks of it, the processing fee is 0%. What the monthly bill is, I don't know.

https://www.shopify.co.uk/plus