B2B Pricing: SaaS Fees, Add-Ons and Total Cost of Ownership

A wholesaler compares two B2B ecommerce platforms.

• Platform A costs £300 per month.
• Platform B costs £1,000.

The decision looks obvious.

Then implementation begins.

Platform A needs an ERP connector, a wholesale pricing app, sales-representative software and another tool for warehouse operations. The website also requires development work before customers can actually use it.

Six months later, the cheaper platform is no longer cheaper.

This is why finding the best B2B ecommerce platform for wholesalers requires more than comparing monthly subscriptions.

You need to understand how the platform charges as your business grows, which features are included, what requires additional software and what the entire system will cost to operate.

That is the difference between subscription price and total cost of ownership.

The Monthly Subscription Is Only the Starting Point

B2B ecommerce software is commonly sold using several pricing models.

Fixed SaaS Subscription

You pay a monthly or annual fee for a defined package.

This is usually the easiest model to budget because costs remain relatively predictable until you change plans.

However, check what happens when you add users, integrations, warehouses or advanced functionality.

Tier-Based Pricing

Your plan determines which features and limits are available.

Higher tiers may unlock additional users, catalogues, locations, automation, APIs or B2B functionality.

This looks straightforward until one requirement forces you onto a much more expensive tier.

GMV or Revenue-Based Pricing

Some platforms increase pricing according to Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) or online revenue.

This aligns cost with growth, but it also means your ecommerce bill can increase even when your technical requirements have not changed.

For wholesalers processing large-value orders, GMV pricing deserves particular attention.

Modular or Add-On Pricing

The core platform has one fee, while additional modules are charged separately.

Examples might include:

• B2B ecommerce
• Mobile ordering
• Sales-representative apps
• Warehouse management
• Route planning
• AI ordering
• Advanced inventory
• Additional integrations

This approach can be attractive because you only pay for what you need.

But you must calculate the price of the actual configuration you will operate, not the cheapest base plan.

Enterprise Quote-Based Pricing

Enterprise platforms often do not publish a standard price.

Instead, pricing may depend on GMV, internal users, regions, hosting architecture, storefronts, integrations or contractual requirements.

Adobe Commerce, Sana Commerce and OroCommerce all currently use some form of customised pricing for their enterprise offerings.

For a larger business, this is normal.

It simply makes direct price comparison more difficult.

How Current B2B eCommerce Pricing Models Compare

Published prices change frequently, but the current market illustrates how different the models can be.

Platform	Published Entry Point	Pricing Model	Important Cost Considerations
Shopify	From $39/month monthly	Tiered SaaS	B2B now available across plans; advanced functionality varies by tier
Shopify Plus	From $2,300/month on eligible long-term pricing	Enterprise SaaS	Unlimited B2B catalogues and broader enterprise capabilities
BigCommerce	From $39/month	SaaS + GMV thresholds	Plan upgrades, GMV overage and payment-provider fees can affect cost
BigCommerce Performance	From $1,499/month	Enterprise / volume-based	Contracted pricing for high-volume businesses
Simplisales	Free; paid plans from $140/month	Modular wholesale SaaS	Ecommerce, stock, AI, field sales and delivery modules vary by plan/add-on
Sana Commerce Cloud	Request pricing	Enterprise SaaS	Pricing based on requirements and ERP environment
OroCommerce	Request pricing	GMV + users + deployment	Licence influenced primarily by GMV, admin users and hosting model
Adobe Commerce	Request pricing	Enterprise SaaS/PaaS	Implementation, infrastructure and development can materially affect TCO

Prices above are published platform prices checked in August 2026 and exclude tax, implementation and other costs unless the provider states otherwise.

The table also demonstrates why searching for the best wholesale ecommerce platform purely by monthly price can be misleading.

Two platforms charging similar subscriptions may include completely different capabilities.

Shopify: Low Entry Cost Does Not Mean You Need Shopify Plus

One important change in 2026 is Shopify’s B2B pricing model.

Historically, businesses often associated native Shopify B2B with Shopify Plus.

That is no longer entirely true.

Shopify has extended foundational B2B features across Basic, Grow and Advanced plans without a separate B2B fee.

Those plans can support features such as company profiles, custom catalogues, pricing, quantity rules and payment terms.

There are still limits.

Basic, Grow and Advanced currently support up to three active B2B catalogues across B2B markets, while Plus offers unlimited catalogues and more advanced assignment and enterprise functionality.

For a smaller wholesaler, that makes Shopify considerably more accessible than it once was.

For a wholesaler with hundreds of individual price structures, complex account hierarchies or substantial enterprise requirements, the practical cost may still move towards Plus or additional systems.

BigCommerce: Watch GMV and Payment Costs

BigCommerce illustrates another pricing model.

Its current self-service plans begin relatively cheaply, but tiers are linked to sales volume.

The Scale plan also applies an overage model above its GMV threshold.

Following BigCommerce’s June 2026 pricing update, merchants using certain Open Payment Providers on self-service plans can also face an additional fee calculated against eligible order GMV.

That means the platform subscription alone may not tell you what a high-volume wholesaler will actually pay.

When comparing platforms, model your expected annual B2B sales rather than evaluating today’s turnover.

A platform that looks inexpensive at £500,000 of ecommerce revenue may behave very differently at £5 million.

Add-Ons Can Change the Comparison Completely

Suppose a platform costs £300 per month.

Then you discover that you also need:

• £300 per month of additional apps
• £500 per month for ERP connectivity
• £8,000 of implementation work

Your first-year cost is no longer £3,600.

It is £21,200 before payment processing and internal labour.

That example is hypothetical, but the principle matters.

When evaluating B2B ecommerce software, ask whether the following are native, paid add-ons or separate third-party products:

Capability	Why It Can Affect TCO
ERP/accounting integration	Connector licences and implementation
Customer-specific pricing	May require higher tier or extension
Mobile B2B ordering	Separate app/module on some platforms
Sales-rep ordering	Additional seats or software
Multi-warehouse inventory	May require WMS/inventory platform
Purchasing	Often outside ecommerce
Picking and packing	Usually external on commerce-first platforms
Delivery routing	Usually specialist software
Search and merchandising	Enterprise add-ons may apply
API access	Sometimes restricted by plan
Additional storefronts	Can increase licences or implementation
Support/onboarding	May be standard, premium or partner-delivered

The cheapest platform can still be the right platform.

You simply need to compare complete architectures rather than licence fees.

Calculate Total Cost of Ownership

A useful three-year TCO calculation should include:

**Platform subscription

• paid modules/apps
• implementation
• integrations
• design/development
• payment or GMV fees
• hosting/infrastructure where applicable
• ongoing maintenance
• support
• internal administration**

Internal administration is frequently ignored.

Imagine your ecommerce system does not synchronise customer pricing properly.

Someone may spend ten hours each week maintaining price lists.

That labour is part of the cost of the platform even though it never appears on a software invoice.

The same applies to manually re-entering orders, correcting inventory, exporting spreadsheets or resolving integration failures.

The Best Platform Depends on What You Already Have

There is no universal best B2B ecommerce platform for wholesalers.

A wholesaler with SAP, an established WMS and an internal development team may prioritise a sophisticated customer-facing commerce engine.

Adobe Commerce, OroCommerce or another enterprise platform could make sense because the surrounding operational infrastructure already exists.

Another distributor may currently operate with Sage, spreadsheets, email orders and a warehouse team.

That business may receive more value from software that combines customer ordering with inventory, purchasing, warehouse and sales-representative workflows.

The question is therefore not:

“Which platform has the most features?”

Ask instead:

“Which systems will we still need after buying it?”

Where Simplisales Fits

Simplisales uses a modular wholesale-first pricing approach.

The current structure begins with a free plan, followed by Essential at $140 per month, Professional at $700 per month and custom Enterprise pricing.

Rather than focusing only on storefront ecommerce, the platform can extend into purchasing, AI order capture, multiple warehouses, advanced stock management, field sales, route planning and B2B ordering.

Some capabilities are included at higher tiers while others can be added separately.

For example, the current pricing structure lists modules for B2B ecommerce, advanced stock management, field sales and route planning alongside the core Simplisales Dashboard.

This can change the TCO calculation for a wholesaler.

If you already have strong purchasing, warehouse and field-sales systems, you may not need those capabilities.

If you currently pay for several disconnected tools, bringing more operations into one wholesale platform could reduce integration and administration costs.

The right comparison is therefore not:

“Simplisales monthly fee vs ecommerce platform monthly fee.”

It is:

“What does our complete wholesale technology stack cost under each option?”

B2B eCommerce Pricing Checklist

Before signing a contract, confirm:

• Monthly and annual platform fees
• Contract length and renewal terms
• GMV or revenue thresholds
• Transaction or payment-provider fees
• User and administrator limits
• Number of B2B catalogues or price lists
• Product/SKU limits
• ERP or accounting integration costs
• API availability and limits
• Mobile ordering costs
• Sales-representative access
• Inventory and warehouse functionality
• Implementation and data migration
• Third-party app subscriptions
• Support and onboarding costs
• Development and maintenance requirements
• Expected cost at 2x and 5x your current online revenue

If a supplier cannot clearly explain how your cost changes as you grow, treat that as part of the purchasing decision.

Final Thoughts

B2B ecommerce pricing is rarely as simple as £X per month.

Modern platforms can charge through subscriptions, tiers, GMV thresholds, users, modules, payment fees or customised enterprise contracts.

That does not make any pricing model inherently bad.

A £2,000 platform that replaces four systems may be better value than a £300 platform requiring thousands of pounds in apps, integrations and manual administration.

Likewise, a growing wholesaler does not automatically need an enterprise platform simply because it offers more functionality.

When searching for the best wholesale ecommerce platform, calculate what you actually need today, which systems the platform will replace or connect with, and what the architecture will cost as your business grows.

The best B2B ecommerce platform for wholesalers is not necessarily the one with the lowest subscription.

It is the one with the most sustainable total cost of ownership for the operation you actually run.