Kim,

You were not warned because your account was not changed. You were “grandfathered” for being a loyal, active Shopify customer. Your account is still based on the 3% commission model, but you are free to upgrade to another plan if you choose to.

— Last edited 08:50PM, Jul 30, 2007

I’m hoping this will all be explained in due time…

Do we get to keep our current accounts without being charged further? Do we still get to keep the new “extras” such as SSL, use of our own domains and unlimited product numbers, etc.?

I’m sure it was inevitable, but I’m a bit dismayed at the new pricing levels. I’ve talked Shopify up to quite a few people and one of the main selling points was the fact that there were no setup or maintenance fees.

The new site design looks great regardless!

Hi Meashman, yeah i went to a party plan expo on the weekend and gave heaps of info on shopify and raved about how there were no monthly fees. I am going to look a bit silly now when they go and check it out. One of the ladies actually set up her shop yesterday, is she now going to be charged these new fees too, as i told her it was free. Her store name is Juliesrugs.myshopify?

I’ve spent a lot of time getting all the info plugged into shopify to get our store going. I’m in the middle of adding products today when the site went down. Now, it’s back up and says I can’t add more products. I searched out why and found the new terms. Doesn’t look like I’m ‘grandfathered’. The percent of sales instead of a monthly fee is what put me over the edge and got me to pick shopify. Now, I’m going to re-examine my decision, but I’ve spent a lot of time adding products, pictures and shipping info.

Sap,
Same here. I was referred by someone to give Shopify a shot when I was about to go through yahoo.

To Jaded Pixel folks,
There has to be some typr of communication soon on this, as I can only assume that many of us are wondering how it will affect our businesses. My shop isn’t even open to the public yet and now I dont know if it will be. Can we get some info on this for those of us that are already established as store owners?

Thanks.

Oh dear. We’ve been advertising and heavily promoting Shopify’s present (previous I guess) no sign up and pricing fees on our website for over 6 months. Guess thats a days work for me to remove it all and start again.

The pricing page doesnt even say whether the fees are annual or monthly.

— Last edited 11:04PM, Jul 30, 2007

Yup, thanks for the headsup guys, You really need to give your customers notice of this type of thing going on, its not just your business but the livelyhood of all the users currently subscribed.

Hi Cody, I am pleased to hear that my account is still based on the old 3% commission and no monthly fee, but you say i can still up grade, but to what. What are the features of mine now and how do they differ to the new packages and what they offer. Am i now very limited in what i can do? Shopify, for me is such a great idea. I am a stay at home mum, just trying to get ahead in life and selling and making my wall hangings is something i love to do. I have worked very hard with limited knowledge on how to set up a website and i am very proud of myself. I know that everyone here has put a lot of work into their stores also. I have limited resources and know plenty of people in my position. Sorry for my raving but i just had to get that message out.

Emails are trickling out as fast as they can. Sorry if you haven’t got yours yet!

There are no changes for our current customers. Everything stays the same for you guys!

The changes we are bringing online are mainly addressing the concerns of our high volume sellers. We still have a free plan called trial which allows you 5 orders completely free of any charges to test new markets and experiment with.

You can check out the alternative plans on your accounts tab in the shopify admin interface. The main differences between the accounts are basic monthly fees in exchange for much lower transaction fees.

— Last edited 10:00PM, Jul 30, 2007

I have some questions before I make any comments.

Are my clients stores that are already set up and generating the 3% sales commission safe from this change.

If they are grandfathered in for how long or until they close their store front or move along to something else of their own accord.

Are these monthly fees or yearly fees? It is not stated on the pricing page. I am assuming that the reduced commission is supposed to make up for the monthly fees is the idea here.

My personal account was not grandfathered in I just checked. It’s almost finished being designed, but due to designing clients’ sites for shopify has not been finished and I need to know if this will be grandfathered in as well.

The pricing seems fair overall, on new accounts and anyone with high volume or high sales the 59$ plan looks like a cheap option.

Thanks

— Last edited 10:32PM, Jul 30, 2007

Meashman: thanks for the compliments on the site design! The grandfathered accounts will not necessarily get all the new features that we add to the premium plans. SSL of the administration interface is a new feature that is only available to those who upgrade, but we still pay for the SSL certificates for the checkout process and entering your account’s credit card information, so all plans still have SSL security for those areas.

Sap & Matt: the new plans are better values for a lot of people, but we wanted to give our active users the option to keep their existing plans as a thank-you. It’s obvious that both of you should count as “active users” even though you haven’t opened up shop yet, since you’ve both put in so much time adding and organizing your products. So if you haven’t already done so, send us a note through the feedback link at the bottom of the “support” screen of your admin interfaces and we’ll get you grandfathered.

The definition of “active customer” that our system used to determine grandfathering is described here:

http://shopify.info/pricing-changes

Thanks, James. Everything stays the same sounds good for me, now. The upgrade will be a good option later.
Matt

Is the service exactly the same? Or, for example, can a high volume client have checkout and with their own secure URL?

Wow, you guys know how to give someone a heart attack. I’m glad to see you’ve got existing clients covered but please, please, please let us know of this kind of change in advance in future. Also, unless I’m just not seeing it in my stress induced haze, the pricing page doesnt state whether the fees are monthly or annual although I’m assuming they’re monthly?

I really don’t like this. I’ve been a big advocate of shopify and have suggested it to many of my clients. This is going to greatly effect the way that I build stores online. I’ll probably go back to zen cart. Seriously, I’d much rather the 3% fee than a monthly fee. Sure its great for those high volume sellers, but what about the little guy? I just want to say again how much I don’t like this. I think the free version should stay the same for new stores.

I’m lucky that our club’s private shopify store was “grandfathered” – because there was no clue that this major change was coming.

I too have be singing the praises of Shopify to other groups, clubs, and non-profits as it WAS a GREAT and SIMPLE was to setup an online store AS-NEEDED and only be charged for what you use of it. Now that once-great model has gone to pot for the sake of higher-volume customers????

We were getting ready to setup another store – but hadn’t linked it to a CC# yet – now our only choice is to pay a $24/month fee + 2% commission – which for our purposes takes our group’s online store costs from 3% of annual sales to $288/year + 2% of sales – which will likely equate to about a 40%+ commission on our overall sales since we only sell club merchandise periodically throughout the year. Guess what? That’s a non-starter. I wonder how many customers like us you just lost? Is your “high volume” user base worth losing start-ups and non-profits like ours? Must be.

Poor, poor decision-making and even poorer communication about it. Remember that nitch I mentioned in an earlier post about someone who really wanted to push the capabilities of something like this? You just stepped out of it and opened it up to someone else by making yourselves less competitive. Enjoy your $ while you are getting them.

As a loyal Shopify customer I would like to chime in as well. I am disappointed in both the new pricing scheme as well as the lack of feedback obtained from the community before the chance.

As a primarily eBay based business we were drawn to Shopify because there were no monthly fees. We were able to start up slowly grow without the pressure of loosing money on monthly fees.

Recently I have been thinking that we have outgrown Shopify, because the 3% fee has been hurting our ability to compete in the marketplace as well as the limitations of graphical and infrastructure customization without hiring a programmer. I think this change is a big mistake and make shopify no different than Yahoo or any of the hundreds of store options out there. I understand where kimt is coming from and will not be recommending Shopify anymore either.

I’m with Andrew on this one. This doesn’t help those starting out or those with small sales. The real draw of this service is the “pay as you sell” plan.

A better way to do this was to base your plans on sales – so not everyone is forced into this. So anyone selling 100+ items or more per week or month needs to move into this plan.

While the older sites will stay the same, there will be a time you’ll have everyone paying per month. It’s inevitable.

I second the dissent. The draw was no fees – unless you sell.
Since the new Shopify plans are effectively shutting down that ideal it shows speculative, or low capital startup projects are not a priority to jadedpixel. This is no longer for the little guy. I’m installing zencart on my own server, I’ll see how it compares.

I just wanted to post an example to compliment my earlier post:

Our club created a shopify store and sold embroidered Polo’s, duffel bags, and jackets for a special vendor promotion. The way we do it is all pre-order. But Shopify was a PERFECT match for us – as we don’t need to maintain an online store 24/7/365, and we cannot maintain an inventory of items.

So in March, we put our store together to sell these 3 products, privately, to our members for about 30 days. We sold around $1500 worth of product and incurred around $45 in fees from Shopify.

Under your new model (had we not been grandfathered), we would be forced to select the lowest cost plan @ $24/month, and by now, paid for 5 months of fees ($120) + 2% of our sales ($30) and our promotion would have cost us $150 – 300% more than we actually paid and equivalent to a 10% fee on our sales – and that’s not considering the continual monthly fees from this point forward.

We had setup our shop for the last 4 months, and was going to release it in the next week or so. My boss had been grumbling over the 3% commission that Shopify charged, but I was hoping the grumbling would die down toward the site launch (I neglected to tell her this when setting the shop up). Although they came suddenly, the new pricing changes were well received by my boss, and me (now that she’s no longer grumbling).

Thanks.

PS. We are a high ticket item shop, so the new model works for us, despite us not being high volume.

— Last edited 12:18AM, Jul 31, 2007

I agree. I would definitely ask you to consider adding the grandfather plan as an option for new stores. I’m willing to pay 3%, but have no monthly fees and be able to have custom domains.

Thanks for all of your comments. We can definitely look at a special plan targeted directly at registered non-profit organizations.

Giles, I don’t think that paying $24 / month puts Shopify out of range of low capital startup projects. Installing, securing, backing up, and hosting your own server with Zen cart will surely be a lot more costly, either in dollars or man hours, than having a Shopify subscription.

Cody I was referring to situations similar to itbedave’s.
I set up a similar account for my father’s sketches; high price, low volume (100), slow sales to known customers. We wouldnt have used shopify if the monthly fees were there, just basic cheque & mailout. I agree with Karim, the old plan should remain for new customers. Re: zencart, due to the ease & 0$ monthly fees of shopify slowly building a site in spare time was viable.
I pay little for a secure host (asmallorange) and investigating open source options is now looking more interesting.

— Last edited 12:31AM, Jul 31, 2007

Wow – I am so disappointed too. I had numerous clients gearing up to launch stores based on the old plan. But now for a one-time fee of $700 I will be convincing them to go with ProductCart after all. Shopify is far too featureless for $60 a month PLUS 1%. That’s just insane!

So so sad…

well I had better change all of the info on my website too

Wow, i did not mean to stir everyone into such a frenzy. I still want to stay with shopify as i really love it here and am glad that i can stay on my original 3% commission plan and no monthly fee. I actually have not sold anything yet since having my store for about the last 3 months and i can understand from a business point of view that i am not profitable ( yet) for Shopify. Once again this is due to the lack of start up funds for advertising ect of my store. I have been submitting to search engines, writing articles, exchanging links and the list goes on, to try and promote my store and am learning so much on my journey. I am glad that when i do start making sales that i have the option to change to a different plan if it is suitable for me and my business. I think as suggested by Karim that you should offer one option for people like myself who really need a no start up plan to get their stores open and pay their commissions as they sell. That gives the little people like me a chance to give it a go. http://www.kimtdesigns.com

To the Great Folks at Shopify,

I would like to chime in as well. I have recommended Shopify many times in the past for low volume sellers because of the low cost of entry. However, I have also not mentioned Shopify for higher volume sellers because the 3% was too high a sticker shock – even if I think the services are worthwhile.

I support the Shopify team in creatively addressing the needs of the larger sellers. However, I do not support you in eliminating the 3% approach as well. The low cost of entry is what enables start-ups to start up. I suggest adding the old 3% as an option to help new shops enter the market.

My own business has been grandfathered and I appreciate that because I have not built up my own sales yet. But I am very appreciative that when sales do take off, Shopify can grow with me.

Saying that I can make my first five sales on my next business for free is nice. But that certainly eliminates low priced items from consideration. And it requires that I have a certain volume or a high enough markup to pay for the fees right from the start.

We got you guys off the ground with our little shops that grew. Please continue to support the little shops. You never know when you plant a seed, which one will really take off. So, plant lots of little seeds. The more you plant, the more your chances go up.

Perhaps you need to raise the 3% to 4% to make it worth your while. If so, then so be it. None of us know when the next internet millionaire will get his or her start but this optimist will cheerfully share 3% or 4% if I know that when my sales do grow, a higher volume plan is available for me.

Ironically, I have been mulling over and investigating a new shop idea for a while. I am still waiting for information to arrive. I absolutely was going to use Shopify and I may still. But now, a no brainer decision has become something I am really going to have to sharpen my pencil for.

Hi, well I might as well put my 2 cents in.

this is what Tobi said:

“The changes we are bringing online are mainly addressing the concerns of our high volume sellers. We still have a free plan called trial which allows you 5 orders completely free of any charges to test new markets and experiment with.”

Ok so I have a lot of products listed. I sell 5 books, one per month at $2.00 each. So does that mean even though it took me 5 months to sell and have 5 orders that I would be forced to change my plan?

Lets look into this deeper. After making 5 sells I am put on a different plan. I sell a book for $2.00 – 3% commission – Pay pal fees or Google fees – the cost of the book – a monthly fee = not much profit.

This is why I left Ebay because Ebay was eating all my profits. And when Yahoo Auctions closed I found shopify and was so glad I did.

We small business owners, and I think I speak to most of us who are trying to make some sort of living without the high end cost most sites charge. Some of us do not have high priced items or sell in volumes.

Well, what can I say. This really is a shock (for all of us). I just might have to rethink this and stay with Ecrater for it is totally free and I at least I do make sells there. Don’t get me wrong, I really like it here even though I have only one sale that was a bogus one. But I just need to get my store established in one spot because the holiday shopping season is right around the corner and changes like this is what is going to have me look for better options.

Michelle

— Last edited 01:15AM, Jul 31, 2007

@kimt: I don’t think you stirred any frenzy. You just stated what we were all about to say.

I wish I were grandfathered, and have sent an email to still be considered for it (I never activated my account, so I was converted to the trial).

For a small start-up business like myself and others, it was the no monthly fee that brought me here. With the fees in place, I might as well go back to ebay. Yeah, I know the fees are more, but the customer base is HUGE there. You should really think of offering something to the small business people, or I predict you may just scare them off somewhere else. By having no startup cost, you drive many sellers here as well as the large inventory of different products.

I think what I am seeing on where shopify is going is somewhat of an ebay marketplace, but instead of auctions… just a bunch of stores (an ebay without the auctions if you will). By the per month fee, you may just be shooting yourself in the foot and this marketplace idea you want to establish might not work out (in my opinion). I, and I am sure others, are already looking at alternatives. I was going to establish my own shopping cart feature with no fees, but decided… heck I’d pay 3% of my sale for the shopify. Now I’m left to decide to build my own cart, or find another service. (And I really do like this site)

I suggest allow NEW USERS up until a certain time period to get the 3% plan with warning that it will end on a certain date… that any new accounts after that date will follow the new pricing plan. This will give others more time.

[sorry for the long post. just wanted to get my point across.]

ok, my question.

I am grandfathered, as you know, I sell vintage clothing. Each piece is a different product. Several pics each….

Is this going to affect my image space?

Is this going to affect my skus?

I have been with you all for almost a year and am really starting to see sales and such and would hate to loose all this.

Also, My 3% is no where near your fees monthly, so I already know I am not changing my plan, but what am I not going to receive that I receive now or does everything for me stay exactly the same.

I have been promoting you too for other vintage dealers, guess I better stop saying you are free + 3% final.

I stopped Ebaying to do this full time, I am a stay home mom and this is my liveleyhood and I am worried I am going to loose all my hard work.

Please reassure me I am not going to loose a years worth of work and devotion because I loose out on skus and image space. I would be happy to host my pics if there was a way for you to do it in admin so I can put a web address for each pic….....

Thanks

Hello. Well I have 3 stores, one of which just launched, one that I am just finishing (for my wife’s art sales), and one that is operational, but I’ve never generated sales from. If you’ve recently been working on a site to get it ready, but have yet to have any sales then you are called ‘inactive’ and you are not grandfathered in.

It seems sensible that people who have been actively coding, prepping, and working on their sites should be grandfathered in as they (lets take my technologically allergic wife for example) went with Shopify based on a certain set of premises (or maybe they were told how great and simple it was), and have been (for example) even redesigning their own site to create a continuous visual flow between shopify and their new site.

Certainly for some who are professional designers/coders, this might not seem like much work. But for many of us it really is, not to mention prepping images, shooting them in particular ways, etc.

I really don’t mind if Shopify needs to change its pricing plan. I can see the logic in charging people a monthly fee. It will probably eliminate tons of people who set a store up, take up server space, and then never actually use it (something I am guilty of with my first store). But to me it just seems like sensible business practice to grandfather in people who have been recently working on their sites (or who were just waiting till they had more time to work on them) to get them ready to launch.

Its pretty frustrating honestly. I really like what you all have done. I tell my art students, and lots of small business people about your model, and what a great interface you all have created. Less of them will be interested with the monthly plan, but you know your market, and probably your business will be better off for it. But it isn’t good business practice to change someone’s pricing plan under their feet when they have been working towards a specific goal under a different set of premises. Please consider grandfathering everyone in who is already signed up.

Thank you for considering this.

Thank you all for the fantastic feedback.

From personal experience i can tell you that finding the right price for a product is almost a harder process then actually creating it.

We decided early on to grandfather everyone who is already setup on the platform and we also converted people who were actively working on their stores within the last 30 days.

Demo accounts were not included in this as we estimated that most people would remove the demo tag from their store before investing serious work in it.

If you are working on your store but haven’t been grandfathered just send us an email and we will look into it.

Cheers guys, you all rock.

I think ica has the best post so far and I agree with the basis of his/her premise. Right now, I sort of feel all dirty like a beta tester (ick) without being told to wear beta tester protection first. I think that probably has a bit to do with how this thread will fill up over the next day or so.

Jaded Pixel needs to have a pricing model that keeps them salient and solvent and paid well for all the work that has gone into this production. I stated earlier I think the new pricing model is fair, but I think there may be a gap on the lower end of the spectrum and things like Foxycart or Magento may be better options for some people in that lower bracket, but for a business trying to run seamlessly, most will see the added value of hassle free software deployments and hosting etc. I think it will also be better for development in the way it will keep everyone at Jaded Pixel on their toes as far as much needed feature additions go.

I can see both sides of this. I have a business to run and if the money does not add up at the end of the month then it’s not good for the business or the clients (or the principal/s) but with that said I see a gap that if not filled here may become a niche elsewhere. The tail of the comet can bring in more at the end of the day than the head, just check Amazon’s sales.

OK, so I was a bit miffed when I first learned about the new pricing levels…but took a sigh of relief when I learned that existing accounts would be grandfathered and able to retain the free + 3% original setup.

What a bummer to learn that you have to actually have a credit card uploaded to your account for it be considered “active” and therefore grandfathered. So now after spending months designing/setting up an online store for a client and getting into the final stages before opening, I must now go back and tell the client that he needs to start paying at least $24 a month, but really more like $59 to get the decent features, to keep everything we had going before for free? That hardly seems fair…could have easily been avoided if we had some advance notice of this change. At least then we could have added a credit card to the account to make sure it was grandfathered.

Not to mention I just had a client sign up with me to design a Shopify theme for them, after I talked them into going with Shopify because of the fact there were no recurring fees. What do I tell her now? Will I need to refund her money?

Please tell me there is a way to remedy this situation. Otherwise I’m going to have a few irate clients and you’ll have one disgruntled Shopify user/designer/promoter.

I am a bit lucky in this regard as I am in between web design right now and working on illustrations for a client. I am sure if you email Tobi or Cody they will take care of you. My personal store has been worked on in stages due to building sites for other people in Shopify and Textpattern and my site is in the same boat as yours not being grandfathered in, I have emailed them as well. These guys are great and I am sure they will take care of the loose threads for us.

“Demo accounts were not included in this as we estimated that most people would remove the demo tag from their store before investing serious work in it.”

I think mine was still on Demo, but I was trying to learn vision and build my own store. I played with different themes and would eventually default and try to customize it. Please do remember that because it might not look like we were working on our store, it doesn’t mean we abandoned it. I was working on retaking pictures of my inventory to standardized it, logo design, initial layout design, etc.

I have to add my voice to those who are feeling trampled by this.

As others have said I have been standing on a soapbox to our customers about shopify for some time now. Our business is geared toward VERY small businesses. The main selling point for many of them (and, ergo us) has been that if their startup flounders or takes some time to get rolling they have no monthly bill for the cart until they start making sales.

For many of these micro-businesses EVERY expense is a major one.

It is all well and good to grandfather in existing accounts (although making a distinction between ‘Active/Inactive’ seems like a penny-wise, pound foolish decision…) but, eliminating the no-monthly pricing will essentially negate shopify’s single largest selling point to a majority of my customer base.

You have made me, and who knows how many other designers look (and feel, to a degree) like fools or liars.

What are we to tell our in-progress clients? The service that they signed up for based on our recommendation just changed the deal without warning or notice. Had a deadline been announced, we easily could have arranged for them to qualify for ‘grandfathering’.

In addition, why weren’t the designers given notice of this? You do realize that you just slapped your sales force in the face with this…don’t you? We receive nothing from shopify for espousing your virtues. Most all of us can design using alternate e-comm solutions, but we choose to build using shopify because we like it. We like what you have built, we like the system and we like the people behind it.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but today…I like it just a little bit less.

Why would you want to alienate your best salesmen? I don’t get it, it feels like a dirty trick has been played.

Matt Beck
Partner
CouldBe Studios

I have to agree with the others in this thread. This change was very abrupt and, quite frankly, says a lot about how much Shopify cares about it’s users. No heads up, and accounts had to meet certain requirements in order to remain on the legacy plans..What about the accounts that were basing their business model on the old plans? What about accounts that were days away from having CC’s on file? I do work for several nonprofits that were very interested in starting to use shopify based on it’s very risk-free commission-only payment plan. I know how have to go to these clients and explain to them that they won’t be able to do what I had promised them.

Your treatment of myself and my company has been very poor, and we won’t forget that. The least you could have done is given us A) 2 weeks notice MINIMUM B) Allowed all prior accounts to stay with the old plan or C) Not made the move to this crappy pricing plan in the first place. I’ve seen much larger companies make much smaller offenses and fail because of them. I hope you know what you’re doing.

Sincerely,
Mike Riess
TCS

The deciding factor in signing up with Shopify was the lack of monthly fees. For a new business with no income, a monthly fee makes it that much harder to start.

Why should a new customer signup with Shopify when other stores like Yahoo! Store have hundreds more features for the same price? Your pricing was a great differentiator which you’ve now lost.

I really like Shopify after using it to setup my store. However, I found that out after signing up and trying it out, something that would have never happened with the new pricing model.

At the upper end of the scale it is $299/month plus a percentage of sales and still no product support offered?

And it doesn’t look like this forum will be a good place for new sign-ups to come to for advice right now.

Whilst im not affected as i can stay on the currently plan ive got to echo the same concerns. The only reason i am with shopify is because there was no start up costs (i couldn;t afford to pay a web designer) and zero monthly fees so i could build up my business without my capital being eroded by monthly fees. Judging by my quick calcs (i hope i didn;t get them wrong) you would need a monthly turnover of approx $3000 to be better off from these changes on the $59 plan.

cheers

steve

— Last edited 05:53AM, Jul 31, 2007

here is the graph (hopefully) i used

Must say I find this thread very amusing! What a bunch of moaners and whingers.

A few home truths:

1. Shopify is an excellent eCommerce platform – the users always want more features but this is true of every piece of software and the guys at Shopify always look to factor them in if they are in demand.

2. Anyone with a working account – there is no change, the charges are exactly the same – so stop moaning!

3. I suggest that anyone who finds these fees to expensive go away and look for an alternative. I’ll guarantee 90% will be back when they find that there is no other solution as economical and comprehensive in features.

4. If the fess are too expensive then I suggest the shop owner reconsiders their future in online retail. They either need to look at their margins or choose a different career.

5. Those who think that Zen and osCommerce are cheaper then do your sums again – they are not. Even if you build the site yourself look at the development time, the support, the patches, the stress…

6. For the person who said:

now our only choice is to pay a $24/month fee + 2% commission – which for our purposes takes our group’s online store costs from 3% of annual sales to $288/year + 2% of sales – which will likely equate to about a 40%+ commission

Get a life…if you are selling so little then you have had a lucky break with the ride you have had. Shopify have been subsidising your business and now you have to decide whether it is worth selling online…and if so…you need to cover your costs rather than Shopify covering your costs.

7. I would second the increase in fees for those who don’t want a monthly fee:

Perhaps you need to raise the 3% to 4% to make it worth your while.

Good comment, maybe even raise it to 4.5%

8. Using Steve’s graph it looks like there is no real detriment to a monthly subscription unless you are bringing in less than $100 a month…at that point you need to be seriously asking whether you need a store for that and why Shopify should subsidise it.

9. Lastly, the only criticism I would have is that the change should have been announced to existing customers a month before it happened. By the time of the change, most existing customers who have come to terms with the change and it wouldn’t be an issue. people don’t like change…they need time to understand the repercussions.

Overall, a good move Shopify to readdress their fee structure…if it means a better service then I am all for it.

Rachel.

Well i suppose i was stupid to think that i could start a home business and i am really kidding myself. I think Rachel is right that i am probably just a moaner and a whinger, up until this morning i was determined to prove to myself that i could do this. As the old saying goes you have to have money to make money, and i don’t, so i will leave it up to the people that do. Thanks Rachel for making me feel inadequate, it is just what i needed. PS If i had of been told about all of this first and that my account was staying the same i would not have posted the first comment, nor would i have had a problem with it but when you find this and do not know what is happening of course you want to KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON

Wow Rachel, just wow.

I’m not sure what planet you are on, but apparently it is one in which only large business has a place.

Every business starts somewhere, many are side projects run out of the home.

What’s wrong with someone making a little extra scratch off of an online business?

There are lots of reasons to sell online that don’t require it to be your bread and butter, primary source of income.

Most web-comics for example are happy to sell a few t-shirts a month at $15.00 → $20.00 each. It’s not going to pay their rent, but the little extra cash gives them an incentive to keep writing their comic. For them, shopify is no longer going to be an option, and that’s a pity.

Many of our customers want a cart as a part of their overall online presence, but don’t need or expect it to make up a majority of their sales. They just want a place where they can direct people who prefer to buy online, or sell a few minor things on the side as part of their site.

What, exactly is wrong with that?

What’s wrong with someone making a little extra scratch off of an online business? What, exactly is wrong with that?

Nothing Matt…but it costs Shopify to put your store online. Market forces dictate that the online store provider needs to cover their costs and run their business. If you can find a provider that has the same functionality and the same passion to improve their service as Shopify…then I’m sure the Shopify guys will say go ahead and use it…good on you for finding it.

kimt…sorry to be so harsh…but if you think that $24 a month is expensive for starting your own business and operating an online store then you will probably not cut out for it.

As I said on my previous post – the communication was poor and people are justified when complaining that they could have been given more notice. I am still yet to have an email to tell me of the new structure…

Even so…the cost to value ratio of Shopify is still superb and I challenge anyone to better it…even if sales are low value each month.

I will add that there maybe scope in the pricing structure to have a ‘no monthly fee’ charge – maybe at around 5%. This gives a no fixed cost option and a higher variable cost per sale that can be absorbed when the transaction takes place.

All the banks in the UK have introduced a charge of $20 per month for those accounts that aren’t being used much – maybe those on 5% could have a stipulation that they need to be used or a small admin charge ($5 per month) will be taken for dormant accounts.

Seriously Rachel, you are way out of line.

I agree with a little of what you’ve said but the incendiary nature of it is clearly designed to provoke a reaction, no?

I have only two complaints with the change. One that the manner in which this was announced I believe demonstrates naívety rather than anything else and may unfortunately have ramifications way beyond today – I’m in the same boat as Matt in that I’ve been promoting Shopify heavily to my clients and on my website (with JP’s blessing due to the fact that they’ve provided logo’s etc for the purpose along with a preferred designer listing). Providing adequate notice would have been a simple courtesy which allowed developers like myself and end users to get their houses in order in time for the switch. If you know as much about business as you seem to be suggesting then have you considered the potential legal exposure for everyone involved with this kind of arbitrary, unnannounced switch? which brings me to my next point;

Shopify heavily promoted themselves as the non-setup fee, non-monthly fee option from day one. It was their main selling point and I believe in the long term would have worked out well.

Telling people to get a life? Not smart, not nice. No-ones had a lucky break and Shopify have not been subsidising anyones business – they chose their business model and promoted it heavily. The customers responded to their offer. That they chose to change it is a decision for them – how they have made the transition, well, that could have been better. Flaming people for using a service which JP chose to provide and heavily promoted is a touch unfair, dont you think?

You clearly dont remember the massive backlash eBay faced when they pulled a similar stunt with their fees last year. Not only did it make front page news and night-time tv headlines but it also cost them an army of customers and billions of dollars.

There’s nothing wrong with the new fee structure, in fact for some it could be an improvement but I think its a big mistake for JP ditching their main selling point (3% commission only) when there is so much competition out there. There are other platforms out there and others coming along so its not a simple take it or leave it and I’m sure JP dont share your attitude.

The biggest concern I have now is that clearly this move was prompted by the realisation that Shopify was not making enough money and judging by the reaction we’ve got here, this is certainly not going to win hearts and minds, so how secure is the future of Shopify as a platform.

People have built their businesses around and staked their reputations on Shopify as a platform and you have no right to make light of it nor abuse people for airing their concerns.

It would be one thing if Tobi and the Shopify team had said, due to increasing costs we will be discontinuing the free hosting plan. But instead all we got was ‘The changes we are bringing online are mainly addressing the concerns of our high volume sellers.’ But what about the concerns of low volume sellers? The ones that believed in Shopify and sold it to their clients as a great place to start their new online business? Are they not welcome here anymore? I would much rather hear them come out and say that, then to beat around the bush and pretend that nothing has changed. I really thought Shopify had a unique idea with offering free hosting in exchange for a percentage of sales.

Tobi, were the low volume sites really costing you a lot of money and so you decided to cut them off (other than the ones you grandfathered) or did you just neglect to notice this segment of your users when creating the new plans? Is there any chance you would consider adding in a ‘Startup’ plan similar to what you offered before?

I appreciate your response.

Karim

Please Shopify pick a camp:

Commission based

OR

Monthly Fee

As a web designer selling this store with both types of fees is ridiculous! I am not happy.

PLEASE OFFER NON COMMISSION BASED PRICE?

OR

PLEASE OFFER NON MONTHLY FEE PRICING?

PLEASE!!!!

YOU SHOULD HAVE JUST BROUGHT IN ANOTHER PAYMENT PLAN THAT IS MONTHLY FIXED PRICE - I WOULD SIGN UP FOR THAT!

— Last edited 07:56AM, Jul 31, 2007

To Rachel,

Thanks for your ideas!

I’m software developer and help my mom to use shopify for her little business.

I see now, there are a lot of people, who likes pay commission (and zero monthly fee) for little shops.

So I’ll start next week new web project for little shops.

I pay $300/month for dedicated server, so 3% commission would be for me enough.
The only restriction for the FIRST TIME - I can provide only 1-3 templates for shop design. Later I buy more.

Please drop me email shop@info-atelier.com, who would like to put free shop online with me!

How should I name my project? “shoppy.com”?
I would be glad to get your suggestions!

Regards.
Dimi

— Last edited 08:20AM, Jul 31, 2007

I would like to know how you started your business Rachel, did you just fall on your feet or was there a lot more to it than that. Maybe you could start a topic on here, with all of your suggestions on how a stay at home mother can start one. I can give you a copy of my personal budget which usually leaves me around $20 per week to do what i want with and i decided that i would try to start a small online home business instead of spending the money on other things( this is after all of the household bills and living expenses are paid of course) So far over the last 6 or so months i have worked hard to make about 15-20 wall hangings. I use the $20 to purchase fabric one week and then the next week other supplies until i have enough to make the wall hangings. So back to your “If you think $24 a month is too expensive ”, yes i do. I could afford the $24 but then i would not be able to make my wall hangings. Oh and i forget the exchange rate to convert USD to Australian Dollars so it would be more than $24 for all Aussies.

Thanks for the comments Damien.

Seriously Rachel, you are way out of line. I agree with a little of what you’ve said but the incendiary nature of it is clearly designed to provoke a reaction, no?

We are agreed on the poor communication and the manner the changes were announced. I haven’t defended this.

the incendiary nature of it is clearly designed to provoke a reaction, no?

No, not at all. Just as we have a lot of people on this thread passionately against change…I am passionately for change. If I have offended anyone I do apologise – but I stand by my comments.

As previosuly stated, Shopify should have offered more advanced notice and as Karim mentioned – the terminology in the announcement was also inappropriate for the level of change.

Getting back to the charging structure. Existing customers are safe so they continue to benefit from the same charges – so there will be no complaints from existing store owners.

New accounts have to adopt the monthly fee so developers will have to pitch differently to their customers. people who are new to the store will not know any different and either accept the structure or choose an alternative.

I have just spoken to 3 online store owners who are now considering Shopify due to the lower transaction fees – so it also works the other way with Shopify attracting more stores by having a monthly charge.

Dimi…good luck with your business…let me know when you make your first million :o)

kimit…

I would like to know how you started your business Rachel, did you just fall on your feet or was there a lot more to it than that. Maybe you could start a topic on here, with all of your suggestions on how a stay at home mother can start one.

Sorry for being harsh…and I do appreciate how hard it is to start a business.

I am also a stay at home mum who started with nothing. I had no assistance or hand-outs – I simply found a market that provided products in demand and started to sell them. It wasn’t easy to get going, and it took time, but I eventually got there.

My daughter suffer badly with Reflux and we couldn’t get the products we needed without importing them at great cost. Instead, we imported more than we needed so we could sell on to other UK parents – the demand was there and we are happy to help other parents in a difficult situation.

Happy for you to contact me directly from my website if you want to chat – happy to help any way I can.

Rachel.

Rachel, why did you make comments that made me feel like it is a waste of my time, when you started out like me, as i am now. My husband told me that i would never get anywhere with this and he caught a glimps of a reply that i was reading (i did not want him to see this forum with your comments)and he has read all of the comments now. All i have heard all afternoon is ‘I Told You So’. He totally agrees, that i am not cut out for this and said that i should stop.
I had convinced him that Shopify was so great because i could have a go just like the next person and i could actually do it with the very limited money that i have. I am lucky that my store was grandfathered, and my fees have not changed but my husband says i am going to have to forget about it now. I am so disappointed and upset as in my heart i know i can do it, Rome Was Not Built In A Day. I will have to do a lot of convincing tonight won’t i.

@kimt I’m really sorry to hear that, its a very disappointing attitude.

Its not really relevant to this discussion so I’ve continued here

kimt…I do sympathise with your situation. Not having the support of your family is one reason that most small businesses fail. Harsh, but it is reality.

as in my heart i know i can do it

Good on you…so do it then. Don’t look at the negatives and give it a go! Look at how you can market your products to give you a greater revenue.

One of the by-products of getting a business going and succeeding is the smug grin you can give to those who doubted you.

You need to be thick skinned and if you believe in yourself then you are half way there already. If you are struggling to get family support then I suggest you find a good forum for business start-up – especially one with a stay at home mum theme.

Try:

http://tinyurl.com/34anff
http://www.parent-world.com/forums/
http://www.babyworld.co.uk/features/work/mumpreneurs1.asp

...these are a good place to start but there are many other if you use google.

Rachel.

I agree that Rachel was a bit harsh with her post although she brought up some good points. I for one don’t appreciate being called a moaner or whiner. Most of us are only speaking out for our clients and potential clients. Not everyone can have an online store selling thousands or even hundreds of dollars a month. That was a good draw and an excellent selling point of Shopify, until yesterday that is.

Rachel mentions that “Anyone with a working account – there is no change, the charges are exactly the same – so stop moaning!” Clearly this is not the case. I’m “moaning” because a client account we’ve had for months that we’ve been actively designing and updating is now dictated to the free trial plan that doesn’t allow you to do jack…simply because there wasn’t a credit card on file. I’m sorry, but the account was still “active” whether there was a credit card on file or not. And it’s just not acceptable that this client has to start paying monthly fees when he’s been told since the beginning that there were none. This makes Shopify look bad and it makes me look bad.

I have other in-progress clients also that will not be thrilled about this (or the fact that I suggested Shopify to them).

At least new clients will be well aware of Shopifys pricing levels from the getgo. Then again, who’s to say it’s not all going to up and change overnight with absolutely no warning? It’s happened before…

— Last edited 03:29PM, Jul 31, 2007

I’m sorry, but the account was still “active” whether there was a credit card on file or not. And it’s just not acceptable that this client has to start paying monthly fees when he’s been told since the beginning that there were none. This makes Shopify look bad and it makes me look bad.

We keep pointing out that anyone who is not grandfathered but thinks they should be, to send us the links to their shops and we’ll look into it.

I just think a solution should be a time deadline to get in on the no monthly 3% plan. It will allow any prospective sellers to finally join if they were thinking about it and allow inactive sellers to become active to get their account in as well. We all know that this price change will benefit high volume sellers, so give the little guys extra time.

I haven’t heard any replies from the shopify team, so I bet they are working on a solution as we speak OR are just waiting for everything to just pass by.

What worries me was the lack of communication on their part about the change? Who’s to say next time, they’ll raise everything by 5% without warning and just say no one gets grandfathered in. We would all be out of luck, especially those that invested lots of money for design layouts, etc, unless we just take the increase. Many might say 5%... yeah right, it won’t happen. All I can say is you never know… Did you expect this price structure change? I surely didn’t and how do we know this won’t happen again without warning?

@daniel: I’ve sent an email. How long until we find out?

— Last edited 04:37PM, Jul 31, 2007

Daniel,

Thanks for the reply. I saw where it was posted about this early on and I sent a note through the feedback link under support in both of the accounts I’m concerned about. They are the same two I have listed in my signature for easy reference. I have received no replies as of yet and both accounts are still listed as “Trial”.

In my humble opinion all existing accounts should be automatically grandfathered in. You instated this drastic change without a warning, this courtesy is the least you could extend to your loyal users.

Rob echoes my sentiments…I’ve lost faith in Shopify to not pull something like this again in the future with no advance communication.

Assuming that we will be able to get grandfathered in… what were the specs?

How many blocks (or mb of space was allowed)?
Will we still get the discount feature?
What is the max sku’s?

Anyone that remembers, please let me know. I can find the info anymore. Thanks.

Rob, these things were basically unlimited before with the 3% commission from what I can remember. But I’m curious to know if this will stay the same for those granted the grandfathering privilege.

Rob, Meashman. I was grandfathered in. My account page now shows: Max Sku’s : 2000, 1 block (40MB), other available options: discounts, stats, own domain.

— Last edited 08:24PM, Jul 31, 2007

@Andy: Thanks for the info.

Has anyone that was NOT automatically grandfathered but emailed support to be been contacted yet? I still haven’t heard a reply. I just want some update. Thanks.

Nothing here yet…I’m waiting on an update as well.

No word yet.

Hi folks, If you’re waiting on answers tonight, just a heads up: it’s Tobi’s bachelor party tonight and him and the rest of the jP crew (minus myself) are out celebrating.

Months (and months and months ago) I asked why, when I sold and deleted an item, my used storage did not decrease, and was told the “40mb max is not being enforced.” I have been “maxed out” for months, because my storage capacity NEVER decreases no matter how many items I delete. (and in fact I tested it again last week, prior to the current bruhaha….)

Is this going to be fixed prior to actually enforcing the new pricing levels? (since, as a small-time seller, I don’t wish to change my current pricing level)

Hi chele,

We will ensure that all the storage numbers are correct before we charge anyone.

”For the person who said:

now our only choice is to pay a $24/month fee + 2% commission – which for our purposes takes our group’s online store costs from 3% of annual sales to $288/year + 2% of sales – which will likely equate to about a 40%+ commission

Get a life…if you are selling so little then you have had a lucky break with the ride you have had. Shopify have been subsidising your business and now you have to decide whether it is worth selling online…and if so…you need to cover your costs rather than Shopify covering your costs.”

Wow Rachel – If the creators of Shopify has such a narrow mind about the various ways Shopify could be used and the users themselves, none of us would be here. Luckily – they did not share your attitude about what constitutes a “worthy” use of their product.

Maybe if you READ a little bit more of my original posts, you’ll understand how WE are using it and why. Get a life? Get a clue!

When a product is sold to you based on a key feature (no startup cost), and then you help sell that product to others based word of mouth based on that key feature – and then the maker goes and takes away that key feature – I think customers have a right and responsibility to speak up about it. Shopify hasn’t been subsidizing our club (NOT a business!) – they advertised that as a KEY REASON to use it!

And while they have every right to change their minds on their fee structure – because I and several others don’t like it or the way they did it – makes me a whiner???

My guess is you think we’re all whiners (check your spelling) because this change BENEFITS YOU. I’m so happy for you being so successful now that you will take the time to come here and criticize us unworthy users because our issues are somehow secondary to your own.

Good luck – with that attitude, your business will need it. I suggest you spend your time figuring out how to make your business survive under the weight of that ego instead of criticizing and explaining to the rest of us individually why we’re wrong when you don’t even start the process by reading an entire post!

Good day.

Hey Paul, say congrats to tobi for me. I guess you’re holding the fort – bummer.

It’s a dirty job, but someone has to do it ;)

Congrats to Tobi from me as well!

— Last edited 04:51AM, Aug 01, 2007

Thanks for your kind comments itbedave.

Rachel.

I would consider them more “in-kind”. You reap what you sow.

— Last edited 05:18PM, Aug 01, 2007

Just an update for those waiting a response. My account was just converted to the grandfathered plan.

I can confirm it is 2000 max skus and 1 block (40 mb). In case you didn’t know, you can purchase an additional block for $5 a month.