Simple Plans for Every Stage of Your Farm

Great question – this surprises a lot of farmers.

Some farm platforms charge their platform fee on ALL sales – not just online orders. That means if you’re selling at farmers markets, farm stands, or doing on-farm pickup, you’re paying a percentage on those sales too.

Here’s how it typically works:

Most platforms offer an integrated POS (point-of-sale) system for in-person sales. It’s convenient – one login, all your sales in one place. But that convenience costs you.

Example: You do $75,000 in sales per year

• $40,000 online through your website
• $35,000 in-person at markets/pickup

With a platform charging 2% on all sales:

• Platform fee on online sales: $40,000 × 2% = $800
• Platform fee on in-person sales: $35,000 × 2% = $700
• Total platform fees: $1,500/year
• Plus you’re still paying credit card processing (~2.9%)

With Homegrown Hosting + your own POS (Square, Stripe, etc.):

• Platform fee on online sales: $0
• Platform fee on in-person sales: $0
• Total platform fees: $0/year
• You only pay standard credit card processing (~2.9%)

Your savings: $1,500/year

What we recommend:

Keep your online store and in-person sales separate:

For online orders: Your Homegrown Hosting website (no platform fees)

For in-person sales: Use Square, Stripe Terminal, or any POS system you prefer

• One-time hardware cost: $49-$99
• Standard 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction
• No monthly fees, no platform fees

Bottom line: You can have the same convenience (all sales tracked) without paying a platform fee on every single transaction. Most POS systems integrate with accounting software like QuickBooks anyway, so you still get one consolidated view of your sales.

The $1,500/year you save can buy a lot of feed, equipment, or just stay in your pocket where it belongs.

Great question — this confuses a lot of people.

Credit card processing fees (~2.9% + $0.30 per transaction):

• Charged by Visa, Mastercard, payment processors
• Everyone pays these — farmers markets, online platforms, retail stores
• Goes to banks and credit card companies, not the platform
• This is the cost of accepting credit cards anywhere

Platform fees (1.5-3% of all sales):

• Charged by the platform on top of credit card fees
• Only charged by platform-based services
• Goes directly to the platform company
• This is pure profit for them

With Homegrown Hosting:

• You pay credit card processing fees (same as everyone)
• You pay ZERO platform fees
• We make money from your monthly subscription, not your sales

Because it makes their pricing look more expensive.

If they advertised “$169/month PLUS 2% of all sales,” fewer people would sign up.

Instead, they lead with “$159/month” and bury the platform fee in the fine print or FAQs.

Most farmers don’t find out about it until:

• They read the terms carefully (who does that?)
• They get their first payout and notice it’s less than expected
• They’ve been using it for months and do the math

We believe in transparent pricing. One number. No surprises.

We can help you switch.

Switching from another farm website service or similar platforms usually takes 2-3 weeks. Here’s how it works:

1. We build your new site (you keep selling on old platform during this)
2. We set-up (or migrate) your products, photos, and content
3. We test everything
4. You approve
5. We flip the switch (usually takes 1 day of downtime)
6. Cancel old platform

You’ll save money starting month one, and after a few months, the savings more than cover the switch.

Want to see if it makes sense? Fill out our questionnaire and we’ll do the math with your actual numbers.

Yes. 30 days notice, no penalties, no games.

Month-to-month means month-to-month.

Give us notice, we’ll wrap up any final updates, export your site files, and send them to you.

Why we do it this way:

We’re farmers too. We hate long-term contracts and lock-ins. If you’re staying with us, it should be because it’s working — not because you’re trapped.

Most of our clients stick around because their website keeps bringing in customers, not because we forced them to sign a 12-month contract.

Nope. Same price no matter how much you sell.

This is the huge advantage of flat-rate pricing over platform fees.

Example:

Year 1: You do $50K in sales → You pay $1,188

Year 3: You’re doing $150K in sales → You still pay $1,188

With a platform charging 2%:

Year 1: $50K in sales → $2,908 total cost

Year 3: $150K in sales → $4,908 total cost

Platform model punishes growth. We reward it.

The better you do, the better the value gets.

We’re pretty up-front about this.

Included in your monthly plan:

• All hosting, security, backups, updates
• Product updates, price changes, seasonal content
• Technical support
• Regular site maintenance
• Monthly reports

NOT included (quoted separately):

• Major redesigns (changing entire site layout)
• Custom feature development (building something totally new)
• Additional pages beyond standard setup and enterprise pages
• E-commerce add-ons (gift cards, abandoned cart emails, advanced subscriptions on Chick/Pullet)
• Marketing services (Google Ads, email campaigns, etc.)

Most farms never need the “not included” stuff. The plan covers 95% of what you’ll ever need.

Because we’ve built the same site 50+ times.

Custom web designers charge $5,000-$15,000 because they’re building from scratch every time.

We built one really good system that works for farms. Then we customize it with your branding, products, and story.

You get:

• Professional design and customized to your farm
• Proven conversion system (we know what works)
• Fast setup (2-3 weeks, not 3 months)
• Affordable price (we’re efficient)

It’s the same model that makes furniture at IKEA affordable — standardized production, customizable results.

Nope. Build fee is one-time only.

Year 1:

• Build fee: $999
• Annual plan: $1,188 (Pullet)
• Total: $2,187

Year 2 and beyond:

• Build fee: $0
• Annual plan: $1,188
• Total: $1,188

After year one, you’re paying less than $100/month for a complete farm website with ongoing support.

Compare that to platforms charging $3,000+ per year forever, and the value gets obvious fast.

Nope. That’s our job.

You’ll need to:

• Mark products in/out of stock (simple toggle)
• Respond to customer orders (email notification)
• Send us product updates when you want to add things

We handle:

• All technical WordPress stuff
• Plugin updates, security patches
• Design changes
• Adding new products
• Troubleshooting any issues

Think of it like owning a car. You drive it and know when to add gas. We’re the mechanic who keeps it running.

You can, but you don’t have to.

You’ll have full admin access to your WordPress site. If you want to learn WordPress and make changes yourself, go for it.

Most of our clients prefer to just text or email us changes and let us handle it — included in your monthly plan for simple updates.

Best of both worlds: You can DIY if you want, but you don’t have to.