How much does it cost to build a small online store?

With SWAGG, Store Start costs €1,490 and is ready in 3 weeks. It includes up to 50 products loaded for you, card payments, courier shipping and automatic invoicing in SmartBill or Oblio. The price is fixed and final, with nothing added on the invoice. For up to 200 products, plus customer accounts and discount codes, Store Growth is €2,490.

What are the monthly costs of running an online store?

Expect four regular costs: hosting and maintenance, payment fees, shipping and your domain. If we host your store, Care Start is €39/mo, with no minimum term. Payment fees and courier costs go straight to those providers, and advertising is separate: Ads Start is €190/mo, with the ad budget paid directly to Meta or Google.

How much does Shopify cost per month?

On Shopify's Irish pricing page, Basic is €24 a month billed yearly or €32 billed monthly, and Grow is €69 or €92. Card fees come on top, from 2% + €0.25 per online payment on Basic. If you use a third-party payment provider, Shopify adds a 2% transaction fee on Basic. Prices vary by country, so check the page for yours.

How long does it take to build an online store?

Store Start takes 3 weeks and Store Growth 4 weeks. For Store Pro, the timeline is set after a call, because it depends on your pricing rules and integrations. Either way, the exact deadline is written into your proposal. Having your product list, photos, and payment and courier accounts ready is what keeps a launch on schedule.

Do I have to accept returns on an online store?

If you sell to consumers in the EU, yes: they can cancel an online purchase within 14 days of delivery without giving a reason. They generally pay the return postage, but only if you told them about that cost before they bought. Set out your returns policy clearly and build the cost of returns into your prices.

How much does an online store cost in 2026? Full breakdown

Q: How much do payment processors charge per transaction?

It depends on the provider, the card and your country. As a benchmark, Stripe's published rates for a business in Ireland are 1.5% + €0.25 for standard EEA cards, 2.5% + €0.25 for UK cards and 3.15% + €0.25 for international cards, with no monthly fee. SWAGG doesn't take a percentage of your sales or add anything to these fees.

How much does an online store cost in 2026? The short answer

An online store built by SWAGG costs €1,490 for up to 50 products or €2,490 for up to 200, with card payments, courier shipping and invoicing connected from day one. After launch, you pay for hosting (from €39/mo if we host it), plus your payment provider's fees and your courier. On a subscription platform such as Shopify you pay a monthly plan instead: Shopify's Irish pricing page lists Basic from €24 a month billed yearly, with fees on every payment on top.

Below you'll find what pushes the price up, what you'll pay every month, how Shopify, WooCommerce and a custom-built store compare, and the legal requirements worth budgeting for from the start.

The customers are there. Eurostat found that in 2025, 78% of EU internet users aged 16 to 74 had bought or ordered something online in the previous twelve months.

What drives the cost of an online store

A store isn't a business website with a basket bolted on. Every order has to travel from basket to payment, invoice and courier without anyone retyping data, and that is where most of the work sits.

How many products, and who loads them

Store Start includes up to 50 products loaded for you; Store Growth, up to 200. Beyond that, each extra 50 products costs €100, so you know upfront what a bigger catalogue will cost. To keep things moving, have your product list ready with prices, descriptions and photos.

Payments, shipping and invoicing

In every option, customers pay by card, the courier is connected and invoices are issued automatically in SmartBill or Oblio, two Romanian invoicing tools. Using different invoicing software or an ERP? We connect it as an AI automation for €490 setup plus €49/mo.

Features that bring customers back

Filters, customer accounts, discount codes, abandoned-basket emails and product feeds for Meta and Google all come with Store Growth. If you're just starting out with a small catalogue, you probably don't need them on day one.

Product photos

Photos are the first thing a shopper looks at. If yours aren't up to it, our 10 product images pack (€149) places your product in new scenes, at native resolution, with no photo shoot.

Special pricing rules

Selling to businesses with per-customer prices, building a marketplace, or working with pricing logic that won't fit a standard store? That's Store Pro, from €4,900, with the final price agreed after a call.

SWAGG online store prices at a glance

All prices are fixed and final. We're not VAT-registered, so nothing is added on the invoice.

Option	What you get	Price	Timeline
Store Start	Up to 50 products loaded, card payments, courier, SmartBill or Oblio invoicing	€1,490	3 weeks
Store Growth	Up to 200 products, filters, customer accounts, discount codes, abandoned-basket email, Meta and Google feeds	€2,490	4 weeks
Store Pack	Store Growth, plus Identity Start, 10 product images and tracking setup	€2,790	set in your proposal
Store Pro	B2B, a marketplace or custom pricing logic	from €4,900	after a call

Optional extras include 50 more products (€100), tracking setup with the Meta pixel, CAPI and Google Analytics 4 (€190), a static ad pack (€290) or a video ad in four formats (€690). Full details are on our online store development page.

What an online store costs to run each month

You pay for the build once. A few costs carry on every month, and most of them go straight to your suppliers rather than to us.

Hosting and maintenance

If we host the store, you choose a plan with no minimum term and 30 days' notice: Care Start (€39/mo) for hosting, SSL, daily backups, updates and monitoring; Care Pro (€99/mo), which adds two hours of changes a month and a monthly report; or Care Max (€199/mo), with five hours and priority. For a store, where every hour offline means lost orders, backups and monitoring aren't a luxury.

Payment fees

Your payment provider takes a cut of every card payment. As a benchmark, Stripe's published rates for a business based in Ireland are 1.5% + €0.25 for standard EEA cards, 2.5% + €0.25 for UK cards and 3.15% + €0.25 for international cards, plus 2% where currency conversion is needed, with no monthly or setup fee. Rates differ from country to country, so check the page for yours. We add nothing on top.

Shipping, invoicing and your domain

Courier costs are charged per parcel, under your own contract with the courier. Your invoicing software is billed on whichever plan you choose with its provider, and your domain renews every year.

Advertising

A new store has no traffic on day one. If you want to bring it in through ads, Ads Start (€190/mo) covers one platform, Meta or Google, with four new ads a month and a monthly report. The ad budget is paid directly to the platform. More on our Facebook and Google ads page.

Shopify, WooCommerce or a store built for you?

All three can work. The real difference is how you pay: a monthly subscription, hosting plus extensions, or a project paid for once.

Shopify

On its Irish pricing page, Shopify lists Basic at €24 a month billed yearly or €32 billed monthly, and Grow at €69 or €92. With Shopify's own payments, online card rates start at 2% + €0.25 on Basic and 1.7% + €0.25 on Grow, excluding VAT. Use a third-party payment provider instead and Shopify adds a 2% transaction fee on Basic, or 1% on Grow. It's quick to get going, but the subscription and fees run for as long as you sell. Factor in the cost of any apps you need, too.

WooCommerce

WooCommerce is free to download and use as a WordPress plugin, with no monthly subscription. Its own pricing page puts hosting at $25–$350 a month for most stores, and paid extensions at $29–$299 a year each. WordPress and its plugins also need regular updates to keep the store fast and secure.

A store built for you

That's how we work: you pay for the project once, at a fixed price, and for hosting through a Care plan if you leave it with us. Payment fees go straight to your provider. The trade-off: design changes and new features are made by us, from the hours included in Care Pro or Care Max, or by the hour at our listed rate.

A freelancer or an agency

Either can build on any of the options above. Ask upfront which platform they'll use, whose name the accounts are in (store, payments, courier, domain), and who answers if the store goes down on a Friday night.

Hidden costs and legal requirements to budget for

Returns. If you sell to consumers in the EU, they can cancel an online purchase within 14 days without giving a reason. The customer normally pays the return postage, but only if you told them about that cost before they bought. Build returns into your pricing rather than discovering them in month one.
Accessibility. Since 28 June 2025, the European Accessibility Act has applied to e-commerce in the EU, alongside banking, transport and other services. Check with a lawyer what it means in practice for your business.
Legal pages. You'll need terms and conditions, clear returns information and a privacy notice. The wording is your company's responsibility, so have a lawyer draft or review it.
Content. Descriptions, photos and your own time for every product. Short on visuals? See our AI photo and video production service.

How to choose the right option

Start from how you sell today, not from what you'd like to have in three years:

Selling one service or a handful of packages? A business website or a landing page is probably enough, not a store.
A small catalogue and a wish to go live quickly? Store Start.
Up to 200 products, or customers you want coming back? Store Growth.
Starting from zero, without a visual identity or product photos? The Store Pack.
Selling to businesses, with per-customer prices? Store Pro.

And an honest caveat: no store guarantees sales. Sales depend on your product, your price, your traffic and how much shoppers trust you. Our part is a store that's fast, clear and easy to buy from on a phone, with payments and invoicing connected properly.

Getting an exact price for your store

Open our online quote builder, choose an option and any extras, and you get a written proposal on the spot, with scope, deadline and price. Reserve within 24 hours of the proposal and you get 5–20% off, depending on the order value; the Store Pack is already priced as a bundle. The reservation fee is €99, comes off your deposit and is refundable within three days.

The deposit is half the project, with the rest due on delivery. You see the design before any code, and if you don't like the first version, we refund your deposit. We then build on a preview link and run test orders, from basket to invoice. Prefer to talk first? Book a free 30-minute call.