Shopify costs £25–79/month and is built for product catalogues and inventory. If you're a service business, freelancer, or local trader, you're paying for a warehouse you don't have.
Know your tool
Shopify is genuinely excellent software — for the businesses it was designed to serve. That's a narrower group than their marketing suggests.
Shops with dozens or hundreds of SKUs — each needing its own page, variants, inventory tracking, and bulk updates. That's the product Shopify optimises for.
Businesses that ship physical goods with weight-based rates, multiple warehouses, carrier integrations, and fulfilment workflows need Shopify's logistics layer.
D2C brands with recurring physical product subscriptions, cohort management, skip/pause logic, and subscription analytics. This is where Shopify shines.
Established retailers needing POS integration, multi-location inventory, wholesale portals, and deep app ecosystem integrations. For that scale, Shopify earns its fee.
The mismatch problem
Shopify is powerful — but power costs money, and you're paying for capabilities that don't exist in your business model.
Shopify's pricing assumes you're managing stock. If you're a coach, consultant, cleaner, or tradesperson, you're subsidising features for shop owners — not yourself.
Unless you use Shopify Payments (UK only), you pay 0.5–2% on every transaction on top of your monthly fee. That adds up fast — even for a handful of bookings.
Shopify has a steep learning curve. Themes, apps, payment setup, policies, shipping zones — most service businesses spend weeks getting it functional. Then it looks like a shop anyway.
Need SEO? Add an app (£8/mo). Email marketing? Add an app (£15/mo). Reviews? Add an app (£10/mo). Shopify's base price is just the start of your monthly bill.
Shopify themes are built for product grids and cart flows. Service businesses end up with sites that feel like empty shops rather than professional service brands.
Most service businesses need: a homepage, an about page, a services page, a contact form, and maybe a booking link. Shopify makes all of that harder than it needs to be.
What you actually need
A professional website, payment links, and everything a service business actually needs — at a fraction of Shopify's cost.
Describe your business. ChilledSites generates a complete, multi-page professional website — homepage, about, services, contact — designed and written by AI in under a minute.
Link to Stripe, PayPal, Calendly, Acuity, or any booking tool directly from your site. Collect deposits, sell sessions, or take enquiries without building a full checkout.
Every lead lands in your inbox the moment someone submits. No app needed, no monthly add-on — forms are included in your £29/year plan as standard.
Connect your own domain and go live. Hosting, SSL, and fast CDN delivery are all bundled in the annual price. No separate hosting bills, no Cloudflare setup.
Don't like the headline? Say "make it more direct." Want a pricing section? Just ask. No page builder, no code — AI makes changes in seconds.
See visitor counts, traffic sources, popular pages, and device breakdowns — no Google Analytics to configure, no third-party trackers, just clean data in your dashboard.
Side by side
For service businesses — not product retailers. See exactly what you get and what you're paying for.
| Feature | Shopify Basic | ChilledSites Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Annual cost | £300/year (£25/mo) | £29/year |
| Transaction fees | 2% (if not using Shopify Payments) | 0% — use any payment link |
| Setup time | Days to weeks | 60 seconds |
| Site generation | Manual theme customisation | AI generates full site from a prompt |
| Multi-page websites | Yes (shop-oriented) | Yes — Home, About, Services, Contact |
| Contact forms | Requires third-party app | Built in, email notifications included |
| Analytics | Basic (ecommerce-focused) | Full visitor analytics dashboard |
| Product inventory | Full inventory management | Not applicable for service businesses |
| Payment links | Only via Shopify checkout | Any provider — Stripe, PayPal, Calendly |
| AI content generation | Not included | Full AI generation + editing included |
| Custom domain | Extra £12/year (via Shopify) | Connect your own — hosting included |
| App ecosystem | 6,000+ apps (most paid) | Everything included — no app fees |
The real numbers
Most service businesses don't need Shopify. But they discover the true cost only after they're locked in.
plus apps, transaction fees & add-ons
everything included — billed once a year
A typical service business on Shopify Basic — with one email marketing app, an SEO app, and using an external payment processor — pays over £600/year once all costs are counted. ChilledSites covers the equivalent for £29/year. That's a saving of £570+ every year, every single year.
Making the move
Not sure if you should switch? Here's an honest breakdown of who should move — and how to do it quickly.
How to make the switch
Go to ChilledSites and describe your business in one or two sentences. The AI builds your full professional site in 60 seconds — home, about, services, contact, all included.
Paste in your Stripe payment link, Calendly booking URL, or PayPal link wherever you need it. No checkout to build — just link directly to your existing payment setup.
Update your DNS records to point to ChilledSites hosting. It takes about five minutes and propagates within the hour. SSL is included automatically.
Once your new site is live and confirmed, cancel Shopify. Stop paying £25–79/month for a platform built for retailers. You're done — and saving hundreds per year.
Every section, every layout, every line of copy on this page was generated by ChilledSites AI. No designer. No developer. No monthly Shopify bill. Just a prompt and 60 seconds.
Build mine now — from £29/yearCommon questions
ChilledSites builds a professional site for your service business in 60 seconds, for £29/year. No inventory. No transaction fees. No monthly bill.