A dispute settled by a calculator
“Why a site when there’s Wildberries?” and “Marketplaces squeeze out all the profit” — both positions are right in their own way. The difference is not in ideology but in the economics of the specific product and the planning horizon. Let’s lay it out.
What marketplaces give
- Ready traffic. Millions of buyers are already there, with a card on file. You do not need to spend on ads and SEO to be found.
- Turnkey logistics: warehousing, delivery, pickup points, returns — the platform’s headache.
- A fast start: from registration to first sales — 2–4 weeks.
- Trust: the buyer is not afraid to pay an unknown seller — they pay the platform.
What marketplaces take
- Margin. A 15–25% commission + logistics + storage + mandatory participation in promos + in-platform ads (without which the listing sinks). The real combined load is often 35–50% of the price.
- The customer. The buyer is not yours: no contacts, no repeat sales, no campaigns. Every sale is like the first.
- Control. The platform changes commissions and rules unilaterally, can block listings or the whole store — and you are left without a channel in a single day.
- Pricing power: algorithms push discounts, the neighboring listing undercuts, you are in an eternal price war.
What your own store gives
- All the margin is yours. A 2–3% acquiring fee instead of 35–50% of levies.
- A customer base: emails, phones, purchase history → repeat sales that cost 5–7 times less than acquisition.
- Brand and prices under control: no one will force you to join a “Black Friday” at a loss.
- An asset that grows: the store’s SEO traffic accumulates over years and goes to you for free, unlike in-marketplace ads.
The downsides, honestly: traffic is earned by your own efforts (SEO, ads — that is time and budget), you organize logistics and payments yourself, and first sales come not in 2 weeks but in 2–4 months.
The economics on your fingers
A ₽2,000 product with a ₽900 cost:
- Marketplace: commission + logistics + promos ≈ ₽800. Profit ≈ ₽300 per sale. The customer is not yours.
- Your store: acquiring + delivery ≈ ₽350, customer acquisition ≈ ₽400. Profit on the first sale ≈ ₽350, but on the second (the customer is already in the base, acquisition ≈ 0) — ₽700+.
The conclusion from the arithmetic: if the product is bought repeatedly (cosmetics, food, consumables, clothing) — your own store wins hands down over time. If the purchase is one-off — a marketplace may be more profitable.
The strategy of the strong: both
- A marketplace as an acquisition channel: fast sales, demand testing, turnover.
- Your own store as an asset: inserts in orders and branding on packaging lead buyers to the site, where the range is wider, prices a bit lower, and a subscription earns a bonus.
- The base accumulates with you → campaigns and repeat sales make the margin.
- Dependence on a single platform falls: a listing gets blocked — the business does not die.
Takeaway
A marketplace is renting a counter in someone else’s mall: fast, crowded and expensive. Your own store is your own real estate: it takes longer to build, but the asset is yours. Mature e-commerce stands on both legs. To calculate the economics and build your own store with 1C and MoySklad integration — come to us.
