Agency switch without risk.
An agency switch feels risky — duration, cost, support gap. We make it predictable, with a fixed time box and scope.
The worry about switching is legitimate — and solvable.
High switching costs are a symptom of the project's condition — not a law of nature.
Anyone considering an agency switch usually carries four worries: how long does the transition take, what does it cost, who looks after the shop in the meantime — and will it actually get better afterwards? These worries are real, because a switch has genuine one-off costs: the new agency has to understand the codebase, deployments, hosting and business logic. How high those costs turn out, however, does not depend on the switch but on the state of the project. A close-to-standard setup with Git-based deployments and clean documentation is handed over in a few days; it gets expensive with core hacks, missing documentation and knowledge monopolies — and exactly that can be checked upfront instead of feared. The calculation also has two sides: whoever stays out of worry, even though delivery and update status are not right, keeps paying those extra costs every month. What ongoing operations should cost is covered on our pricing page — and how they are secured after the takeover on our page about support & maintenance with SLA. The method behind the switching process is our F.O.C.U.S. system — and the complete process with phase model, asset inventory and handover checklist is available as a whitepaper on switching agencies.
A slow agency is not neutral — it costs.
- Revenue with every incident — without fixed response times, a checkout outage lasts as long as the ticket happens to sit.
- Seasonal business — campaigns and features waiting in the backlog do not sell.
- Security — every month of update backlog raises risk and catch-up costs at the same time.
- Your team's time — it chases tickets instead of working on the business.
- Independence — with every undocumented year, the dependency on the current provider grows.
- Response times with SLA — under 2 hours for critical outages, contractual instead of promised.
- 99.95% uptime in the SLA — monitored, reported, accounted for.
- Updates on a fixed cadence instead of a growing backlog.
- A direct line to developers who know your shop — no ticket forwarding.
- Development with context — the team running your shop also builds the next features, without a familiarisation surcharge.
- Switchability from day 1 — documentation and access belong to you, not to us.
The switch is predictable. We make it measurable.
Fixed time box, €0
Onboarding in 3 days maximum — with a defined scope instead of an open end, and for €0 in combination with a maintenance retainer. If we need longer, that is our problem, not yours.
No support gap
Responsibility transfers on day 1. There is no window in which your shop is unattended — monitoring and availability start with the takeover.
No lock-in
We build every project so that you could leave us at any time — handover protocol from day 1, credentials and documentation belong to you. That is the strongest trust signal an agency can give.
A transparent no
Not every project gets the 3-day onboarding. A short screening call shows upfront whether it is enough — or whether a tech audit has to come first. We tell you before the start, not on the invoice.
Four fears. Four answers.
How long does the transition take?
3 days maximum, with a defined scope — setting up access, reviewing the codebase, tracing the deployment chain and deploying once ourselves, a kickoff call with all stakeholders, and a written handover protocol. After that we are fully operational. The fixed upper limit matters more than any claim of being "fast".
What does the switch cost me?
€0 — we give you the onboarding for free in combination with a maintenance retainer. That is only possible because the process takes us 3 days at most — the offer itself is the evidence that the transition is short. The recurring extra cost of staying — slow delivery, update backlog, growing technical debt — keeps coming back every month. The switch therefore pays for itself from month one.
Is my shop unattended in the meantime?
No. The takeover has no unattended window — responsibility, monitoring and availability transfer to us on day 1 while the onboarding runs in parallel. Ongoing operations are then covered by our support with SLA.
And what if the new agency is no better either?
Then you can leave — at any time. We build every project so that you could walk away from us — handover protocol from day 1, documentation and access belong to you, response times and goals are in the contract instead of the pitch. An agency that builds in switchability has to prove itself through performance every month, not through dependency — and exactly that is something you can measure.
Three days to operational.
30 minutes on setup, deployment and documentation. Afterwards we tell you whether your project gets the €0 onboarding — or needs a tech audit first. That, too, is an honest answer.
Setting up and documenting access to code, hosting, admin and services. Activating monitoring. From now on we are reachable — the support gap does not exist.
Codebase review, plugin landscape, data flows. Tracing the deployment chain and deploying once ourselves — only those who have deployed are operational.
Kickoff call with all stakeholders, recording open issues, written handover protocol. From here on, normal operations with SLA apply.
| Phase | What happens | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Facts | Screening and inventory — code, deployments, documentation, open issues and the real cost situation with the current provider | An honest picture instead of gut feeling |
| Objectives | Defining what the switch should improve — response times, update status, cost per delivered feature | Measurable switching goals |
| Constraints | Naming the risks — knowledge monopolies, contract terms, technical legacy, dependencies on the previous agency | No risk remains unspoken |
| Execution | Onboarding in 3 days maximum — access, codebase, deployment, handover protocol, responsibility from day 1 | Operational without a support gap |
| Scaling | Ongoing operations in the maintenance retainer — monitoring, updates, development steered by impact instead of effort | The switch pays for itself measurably |
A switch is a calculation — not a gut decision.
- Switching on principle — if you are well served, stay.
- Projects that are only looking for the cheapest hourly rate.
- Shops with Shopware 5 legacy and no version control — those need a tech audit before onboarding, and we say so upfront.
- Shops with a running maintenance contract whose agency delivers slowly or bills opaquely.
- Projects with an update backlog where every request disappears into ticket limbo.
- Merchants who want responsibility and documentation back in their own hands.
Frequent questions about switching agencies.
How long does switching to a new Shopware agency take? +
With us, 3 days maximum until we are fully operational — with a fixed scope of access setup, codebase review, deployment walkthrough and handover protocol. Whether your project fits into that window is clarified in a short screening call upfront. The upper limit is binding — if we need longer, that is our problem, not yours.
What does an agency switch really cost? +
The industry-typical one-off cost is the new agency's onboarding — realistically 2 to 5 person-days for a close-to-standard Shopware project, and noticeably more for poorly documented ones. With us the onboarding costs €0 in combination with a maintenance retainer. The recurring extra cost of staying — inflated billing, slow delivery and growing technical debt — keeps coming back every month. The switch therefore pays for itself from the first month.
Why is your onboarding free? +
Because it takes us 3 days at most — an onboarding that took weeks could not be given away. The gift is therefore not a discount but evidence that the transition is short and predictable for you. Two conditions apply — the €0 onboarding comes in combination with a maintenance retainer, and a short screening call clarifies upfront whether your project fits into the 3-day window.
Is my shop unattended during the switch? +
No. Responsibility, monitoring and availability transfer to us on day 1 of the takeover while the onboarding runs in parallel. There is no unattended window — that gap is the most legitimate concern in a switch, and it is solvable through process.
Is an agency switch really as risky as it feels? +
The worry is understandable, but the risk is smaller and more predictable than it feels. What is real is the familiarisation effort — and that depends on the state of the project, not on the switch itself; a screening call makes it visible upfront. Studies also show the bigger risk often lies in letting things run — according to McKinsey and the University of Oxford, large IT projects exceed their budget by 45 percent on average and deliver 56 percent less value than planned.
How do I know my current agency is costing me money? +
By measurable signals instead of gut feeling — ticket turnaround times measured in weeks instead of days; an update backlog of several Shopware versions; a mismatch between billed days and delivered features; incidents that repeat instead of being fixed. Each of these signals costs continuously — revenue during outages, security with the backlog, margin in the billing. Exactly these numbers are what we look at together in the screening call.
What makes a shop expensive to hand over? +
Missing documentation, manual deployments instead of Git, core hacks, unversioned configuration and knowledge monopolies held by individual people. High switching costs are a symptom of the project's condition — not a law of nature. Conversely, a shop built close to standard with a clean deployment chain is handed over in a few days.
What is in the handover protocol? +
All configured access credentials, the documented deployment chain, the plugin and interface landscape, open issues and responsibilities. The protocol is created from day 1 and belongs to you — so that you could leave us at any time, too. An agency that builds in switchability does not need lock-in as a business model.
What happens after the onboarding? +
Ongoing operations in the maintenance retainer — monitoring, security and version updates, bugfixes and development with SLA. Details are on our support page. The onboarding is deliberately not a standalone product but the entry into an ongoing collaboration.
Does the switch require my old agency's consent? +
No. Shop, data and code belong to you — the old agency has to hand over access and repositories. Contractual notice periods of the maintenance contract run in parallel; the onboarding can already happen within that period so no gap opens up at the contract's end.
What is the difference between onboarding and a tech audit? +
The onboarding makes us operational — access, codebase, deployment, handover protocol. The tech audit evaluates your system — with a report and prioritised recommendations at a fixed price. Clean-up work and bugfixes belong to neither block but to ongoing operations — this separation protects both sides from unclear expectations.
