The implementation of an online store depends on many factors. The main element that has a significant impact on the final cost of eCommerce implementation is the scope of the project and the choice of technology that should be maintained and developed in the next step. Of course, the process itself and the agency that carries out the implementation also play a significant role in the entire valuation process. In this article, we will try to present the estimated costs of implementing an online store on Shopify Plus based on our experience with the implementation of this platform.

Shopify Plus an enterprise level software

Shopify Plus is designed specifically for larger businesses. The platform has virtually unlimited scalability, which means that customers can develop their business virtually endlessly. Our experience shows that Shopify Plus is mainly intended for companies that have achieved some stability in the area of ​​online sales.

The fully hosted Shopify Plus platform guarantees 99.99% availability, and the servers can handle up to four million queries per second and thousands of orders per minute, without affecting site performance. Shopify Plus customers also get unlimited bandwidth and up to 200 TB of capacity for virtually unlimited growth.

Most importantly, Shopify Plus provides full customization of your online store. Thanks to full access to the API and website code, the development team can freely shape the final appearance and functionality of the Shopify Plus online store. Access to the wide Shopify Plus marketplace with numerous modules and plugins allows you to meet the needs of even the most demanding sellers.

Key benefits of Shopify Plus

The Shopify Plus platform has many advantages, both in terms of the nature of SaaS services, but also in terms of flexibility and access to editing. The main benefits of Shopify Plus are as follows:

• Scalability – Thanks to proven architecture and proprietary hosting resources, Shopify Plus provides virtually unlimited scalability;
• Internationalization of sales – built-in tools and a wide marketplace allow Shopify Plus sellers to scale their sales to international markets;
• Availability of the API interface – thanks to the open access to the API, numerous connections are possible, including, for example, connecting Shopify Plus to the headless storefront (in our case, we use gatsby.js storefront);
• Affordability – The Shopify Plus license starts at $ 2,000 per month, for which we get a lot of value in terms of security and website stability. Thanks to this, the maintenance costs are extremely competitive, for example in relation to Magento 2;

Basic costs of the Shopify Plus store

As mentioned above, the basic costs of the Shopify Plus platform are combined with the license fee, which in the base version is $ 2,000 per month. Here, however, it is worth remembering that the costs increase when the amount exceeds $800,000 of revenue per month, then the cost of the license increases. In such a case, the fixed license fee is additionally increased by 0.25% of the turnover value up to the specified limit amount. The maximum license fee is $ 40,000 per month.

For example, a company that generates a turnover of $500,000 a month will pay $2000. USD per month as part of the license fee. However, when its turnover increases to $1,000,000 per month, the license cost will increase by $500 per month to $2500 per month. Therefore, it is not a significant increase in license costs, taking into account the increase in the corresponding increase in the online store’s turnover.

In return for covering the license fees under Shopify Plus, merchants receive a number of benefits, including, but not limited to:

• Hosting
• Maintenance and updates
• Shopify POS
• Dedicated account manager
• Support in the implementation and development of the store
• Access to the Shopify Plus API

Comparing the costs of maintenance and updating, the Shopify Plus platform is highly competitive to other enterprise-class platforms, where the platform maintenance itself (DevOps) often costs over hundreds of thousands of dollars per month.

Shopify Plus store migration and implementation costs

The above-mentioned fixed costs of operating an online store based on Shopify Plus do not apply to the main expenses related to the migration and implementation of the eCommerce website. The vast majority of online stores created on the Shopify Plus platform are eCommerce services transferred from other engines, including Shopify, Magento, PrestaShop, WooCommerce or BigCommerce. Therefore, sellers must take into account the cost of migrating an online store at the beginning. It is also worth adding that as part of the migration, the vast majority of customers decide to prepare a completely new look for the online store, and thus implement „from zero to hero”.

As an agency, our experience is based on Shopify Plus implementations in conjunction with headless storefront. This assumes a process approach in which we create an online store „from scratch” while migrating the most important elements of the database from the existing solution on which the eCommerce website stands.

The estimated costs of implementing and migrating the eCommerce website based on the experience of our agency and market data will be presented below:

• $20,000 to $200,000 – the average cost of implementing and migrating a Shopify Plus online store by an agency based on headless commerce (depends on the scope of the project and the complexity of the website);
• $2,000 per month – Annual Shopify Plus license cost, starting at $ 2,000 per month; this increases depending on the turnover of the online store;
• $4,000 – $8,000 per month – costs of maintaining and developing an online store under the SLA agreement with the agency;
• $500 per month – average annual costs of applications and plugins extending the operation of the eCommerce website;
• $250 per month – other possible fees for extensions and additional services (including e.g. hosting for headless storefront)

The above costs are of course an estimate and always depend on the scope of the project. However, if you compare the above costs with the standard implementation and migration of the system to Magento 2, where the cost of the implementation itself usually starts from USD 100,000 upwards, they seem very competitive.

Shopify Plus – an enterprise level software dedicated to demanding customers who are thinking about development

From our experience, Shopify Plus is a platform that will be perfect for larger enterprises that generate over $ 100,000 in monthly revenues and have plans for further dynamic development. In this case, both the cost of implementation and the possibilities offered by the platform itself can be well used, bringing a valuable ROI.

As Blue Owl, we are at your disposal and we will be happy to advise you if and when it is worth changing from traditional eCommerce to the one based on Headless Commerce. Contact us for a free quote or consultation.