What does it cost to have a webshop built? Fair prices and clear scope

The question "what does it cost to have a webshop built" deserves an honest answer. Too often you hear vague estimates or face unexpected additional costs afterwards. Here you'll read what a professional webshop truly costs and why those price differences exist.

Why prices vary so much

Building a webshop isn't a standard product. One shop sells ten items with one payment method, another has a thousand variants, connects a POS system and integrates with accounting software. Agencies often charge by the hour without a ceiling, so you don't know what to expect upfront. Other providers work with fixed packages that prove too broad or too narrow.

At Kattenberg 118 Studio you get one concrete proposal: fixed scope, fixed timeline, fixed price. No surprises halfway through, no hourly billing that runs up.

What determines the price of your webshop

The cost depends on a few clear factors:

• Platform: Shopify is fast and scalable for product shops, Ghost works excellently for content-driven sales, fully custom (like a Payload CMS management environment) suits very specific needs.
• Design: Adapting an existing theme costs less than a completely new custom design. Both can be professional — it depends on what your brand needs.
• Integrations: Connecting with a POS system, accounting software, shipping partner or inventory system requires development time. Some integrations already exist, others you build custom.
• Migration: Moving from an old platform to a new system — with all products, customer data and order history — requires careful work.

Concrete price examples

A Shopify webshop with adapted design, product catalogue and standard payment and shipping options starts from €3,500–5,000. That includes setup, theme customisations and basic training.

A complete migration from an existing platform to Shopify, including POS integration and pop-up configuration, is more like €8,000–12,000. Kattenberg 118 did such a migration for a school: all products, customers and POS system included, within the agreed timeline.

Custom work outside Shopify — think of a Ghost theme with e-commerce integration or a custom Payload CMS management environment — starts from €10,000, depending on complexity.

Consciously choosing the right platform

Not every project needs the same platform. Kattenberg 118 ran two jewellery shops and a webshop for fifteen years, with a team of twenty people at its peak. That experience teaches you not to sell a platform for the sake of selling, but to advise what truly fits.

Examples from own work: a bookshop live within a week on Shopify, a client guided from WordPress to Ghost, another project deliberately advised away from a complicated CMS towards a simple, fast static page. No commercial interest with software partners — the client's budget comes first.

What you get for your investment

A webshop is only profitable if it works: loads fast, manages easily and actually sells. That requires more than a beautiful design. You need clear product pages, a checkout without frustration, solid SEO foundations and a management environment that you understand yourself.

At Kattenberg 118 Studio you don't get an extensive manual — you get a webshop that works logically, with tailored training so you can get started yourself. No unnecessary plugins or systems that break at the first update.

Working together without surprises

Fixed prices mean you know what to expect upfront. Scope is fixed, timeline is fixed, price is fixed. That does require an honest conversation beforehand: what do you want to achieve, what do you really need, what can come later?

This approach saves discussions afterwards and ensures your budget matches the solution you get.

Want to know what a webshop costs for your situation? Get in touch via Kattenberg 118 Studio for a concrete proposal.