The Question Every Etsy Seller Asks Around Sale 100
Somewhere around your first hundred sales, you start adding up Etsy’s fees and thinking about your own store. No listing fees, no 6.5% cut, no surprise Offsite Ads charge. A Shopify store costs $29 a month. How hard can it be?
The fees are real, but they’re only half the comparison. Etsy charges you for showing your shirts to millions of people who are already shopping. Your own store charges you a flat monthly fee and then leaves you alone with an empty storefront. Which one makes you more money depends almost entirely on one thing: where your buyers come from. Here’s the math, side by side, with 2026 numbers.
Short version: On a $27.99 print on demand shirt, Etsy leaves you about $7.93 after fees, or about $3.73 if an Offsite Ad made the sale. Your own Shopify store leaves about $9.93, but only if the buyer found you for free. If you paid for the click, an average apparel ad cost of about $11 per sale turns that into a loss on a one-shirt order. Start on Etsy, because it brings buyers. Add your own store once you have buyers who come to you directly: repeat customers, an email list, a social following, or local orders. For most sellers, the answer ends up being both.
The Real Difference: Rented Traffic vs. Your Own Store
Etsy is a marketplace. It had about 86.6 million active buyers in early 2026, and many of them search for exactly the kind of niche shirt you sell. You pay per listing and per sale, and Etsy brings the shoppers. But you play by Etsy’s rules: its fees, its search algorithm, its policies, and its decision about whether your shop stays open.
Your own store is a building with no street. You pay a flat monthly fee and keep more of each sale, and the customers, their email addresses, and the brand are yours. But nobody walks past it. Every visitor comes from something you did: a post, an email, an ad, a business card at a craft fair.
What Each One Costs
| Cost | Etsy | Shopify Basic |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly fee | None | $29 billed yearly, $39 billed monthly |
| Per listing | $0.20, renews every four months or when it sells | None |
| Per sale | 6.5% transaction fee plus 3% and $0.25 payment processing | 2.9% and $0.30 card processing with Shopify Payments |
| Advertising | Optional Etsy Ads from $1 a day; Offsite Ads fee of 15%, or 12% once you pass $10,000 a year | Whatever you choose to spend |
| Sales tax | Etsy collects and pays it | You collect it and file returns |
| Starting cost | One-time shop setup fee plus listing fees | 3 days free, then $1 a month for 3 months (current offer) |
Both connect to the same print companies, like Printify and Printful, so the shirt and shipping cost the same either way. Shopify’s bigger plans cost more per month but lower the card rate, which only pays off at much higher sales.
Profit Per Order, Side by Side
Same shirt in every column: a $27.99 Bella+Canvas 3001 tee with free shipping, about $12 for the shirt and printing, and Printful’s US shipping of $4.95 for the first shirt and $2.20 for each additional one.
| Order | Etsy | Etsy, Offsite Ad sale | Shopify, free traffic | Shopify, paid ad (about $11) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| One shirt | $7.93 | $3.73 | $9.93 | loss of $1.05 |
| Two shirts | $18.86 | $10.46 | $22.91 | $11.93 |
Three things jump out:
- Free traffic is where your own store wins. A buyer who comes to your store from your email list or your Instagram leaves you about $2 more per shirt than the same sale on Etsy, and more than double an Offsite Ads sale.
- Paid traffic is where it loses. At an average cost of about $11 per sale, a single-shirt order on your own store loses money. That’s the trap many new store owners fall into: they leave Etsy to save on fees, then spend more on ads than they saved.
- Bigger orders change everything. Because the second shirt ships for only $2.20 more, two-shirt orders are far more profitable on both platforms. Bundles, “buy two” pricing, and matching family or team shirts are worth building into any store.
The Product Pricing tab in our print on demand workbook runs this comparison with your own prices, and the Etsy and print on demand profit calculator breaks down any single Etsy sale.
When Your Own Store Pays for Itself
If your own store keeps about $2 more per shirt than Etsy on free traffic, the $29 monthly plan pays for itself at about 15 sales a month from buyers who came to you directly. On monthly billing at $39, it’s about 20. Below that, you’re paying Shopify more than you save on Etsy fees.
Compared with Offsite Ads sales, the math swings hard the other way. Once your Etsy shop passes $10,000 a year and Offsite Ads become mandatory, every attributed sale costs you 12% of the order. Steering repeat buyers to your own store, where that fee doesn’t exist, is one of the clearest reasons growing shops add one.
Repeat buyers are what make paid ads work. If an ad brings someone to your store for about $11 and they buy one shirt, you lose about $1. If they join your email list and buy again later with no ad cost, the two sales together leave about $8.88. Your own store makes sense when you can turn first-time buyers into repeat ones. Without that, paid traffic is a hard way to make money on $28 shirts.
Where Your Own Store’s Customers Come From
- An email list. The cheapest repeat sales you’ll ever get. Collect emails on your own store from day one. Etsy’s rules don’t let you add Etsy buyers to a marketing list without their permission, which is one more reason to have a place of your own.
- Social media in your niche. A following on Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook groups sends free traffic, but it takes months of steady posting to build.
- Local customers. Teams, businesses, and craft fair buyers can reorder through your store, and a store link on a business card or table sign keeps them coming back.
- Search engines. Google traffic to a small store builds slowly, often over a year or more.
- Paid ads. Fast, but expensive per sale, and only worth it with bigger orders or buyers who come back.
The Hidden Costs of Your Own Store
The monthly plan isn’t the only cost. Budget for these before you switch:
- A domain name, usually a small yearly fee.
- Apps and themes. Free versions cover the basics, but reviews, email marketing, and bundles often cost extra every month. Add them only when they earn their keep.
- Sales tax. On your own store, collecting and filing sales tax is your job, usually starting with a permit in your home state. Shopify Tax is free until your store reaches $100,000 in sales. Sales tax for online sellers covers what you need.
- Customer service and disputes. On Etsy, the marketplace sits between you and the buyer. On your own store, refunds, lost packages, and chargebacks are all yours.
- Your time. Building pages, writing policies, and driving traffic take hours that Etsy mostly handles for you.
Shopify isn’t the only option. Other website builders and self-hosted stores work the same basic way, with similar trade-offs: a flat fee or hosting cost, card processing, and traffic you have to bring yourself.
Why Most Growing Sellers End Up With Both
Etsy and your own store do different jobs. Etsy finds new buyers. Your own store keeps them. Running both is easier than it sounds, because your print company syncs the same designs to both and fulfills orders from either one.
A setup that works for a lot of sellers:
- Keep listing on Etsy for discovery and new customers.
- Put your own store’s link on your social profiles, business cards, and craft fair table. Keep Etsy messages about the order itself, since Etsy limits promotional messages to buyers.
- Use your own store for repeat buyers, your email list, local team and business orders, and bundles.
- Keep the same prices on both, so Etsy buyers don’t feel tricked and your own store still keeps more per sale.
So Which One Should You Use?
Start with Etsy only if:
- You’re just starting and don’t have an audience yet
- You want to test which designs sell before paying any monthly fees
- You’d rather not handle sales tax filing and customer disputes yet
Add your own store when:
- You can send it at least 15 to 20 sales a month from buyers who already know you
- Your Etsy shop has passed $10,000 a year and Offsite Ads fees are eating your margin
- You’re taking local bulk orders or building an email list
- You want a business that doesn’t disappear if one platform changes its rules
Skip your own store for now if your plan is to leave Etsy and replace it with paid ads. On $28 shirts, that’s usually a faster way to lose money than to save it.
Fees Are the Wrong Thing to Optimize First
Etsy’s fees are easy to see, so they get blamed. But on a shirt business, the bigger number is almost always what it costs to find each buyer. Etsy finds them for you at a predictable price. Your own store only beats it once buyers start finding you on their own. Build that audience first, and the store becomes the easy part. The print on demand business blueprint shows where each step fits as the business grows.
Related Guides
- Print on demand business blueprint: the full step-by-step plan.
- How to make money on Etsy: every Etsy fee explained.
- Sales tax for online sellers: what changes when you run your own store.
- Print on demand trademark rules: what not to put on a shirt.
This article is for general informational purposes only and isn’t financial, legal, insurance, or tax advice. For guidance specific to your situation, talk to a licensed professional.
Frequently Asked Questions
Etsy is usually better to start, because it brings buyers who are already searching. Shopify keeps more per sale, about $9.93 versus $7.93 on a $27.99 shirt, but only when buyers find you for free. Most growing sellers end up using both: Etsy for new buyers and their own store for repeat customers.
Shopify Basic costs $29 a month billed yearly or $39 monthly, plus 2.9% and $0.30 per card sale. Etsy has no monthly fee but charges $0.20 per listing, a 6.5% transaction fee, and 3% plus $0.25 in payment processing, plus a 12% to 15% fee on sales from Offsite Ads.
About 15 sales a month from buyers who come to you directly covers the $29 plan, since each one keeps about $2 more than the same Etsy sale. On monthly billing at $39, it’s about 20. Sales from paid ads don’t count toward this, since ads often cost more than the fees you save.
Yes. Print companies like Printify and Printful connect to both Etsy and Shopify, sync the same designs, and fulfill orders from either. Many sellers keep the same prices on both, using Etsy to find new buyers and their own store for repeat customers and local orders.
Often not on single-shirt orders. An average apparel cost per purchase of about $11 is more than the roughly $9.93 a store keeps on a $27.99 shirt. Ads work better with bigger orders, like bundles or team orders, and with buyers who come back and buy again without another ad.
Yes. Etsy collects sales tax for you, but on your own store you’re the seller, so you usually need a permit in your home state and must file returns. Shopify Tax calculates the tax at checkout and is free until your store reaches $100,000 in sales.
Sources
- Etsy, Fees and Payments Policy: https://www.etsy.com/legal/fees/
- Etsy, Payments Policy (US processing fee): https://www.etsy.com/legal/etsy-payments/
- Shopify, Pricing: https://www.shopify.com/pricing
- Marketplace Pulse, Etsy number of active buyers (Q1 2026): https://www.marketplacepulse.com/stats/etsy-number-of-active-buyers
- Influee, Average CPA for Facebook ads by industry (2026, AdBacklog data): https://influee.co/blog/average-cpa-facebook-ads
- Printful, Shipping rates: https://www.printful.com/shipping
- Style Factory, Printful pricing (September 2026): https://www.stylefactoryproductions.com/blog/printful-pricing
- eSEOspace, Shopify Tax pricing (October 2026): https://eseospace.com/blog/shopify-tax/