Boutique Agency or Large Agency? The TCO Comparison

Mid-sized merchants regularly face the same question in a Shopware 6 project: a large full-service digital agency with hundreds of employees — or a small, highly specialised agency with two to three developers? This whitepaper compares both models using a concrete, realistic scenario: the relaunch of a mid-sized shop on Shopware 6 with ERP integration, data migration, custom frontend, and a new hosting platform — including three years of operation and further development.

The result of the model calculation is clear — not because of the hourly rate, but because of process overhead, concept phases, and multi-level team structures.

What's inside

• Three-year total cost of ownership: a transparent model calculation — boutique agency around €179,000 versus around €436,000 for the large agency, a factor of 2.4.
• The initial project in detail: effort estimate per work package — ERP integration, migration, frontend, hosting — with hourly rates and a realistic range.
• Running costs: hosting, maintenance, and further development over 36 months — where the real cost difference arises.
• Pros and cons beyond cost: Who actually writes the code? Communication, speed, scalability, failure risk, and SLA in direct comparison.
• Risk and decision guide: What to watch for with small agencies (bus factor, closeness to standard, hosting separation) — and which signals clearly favour the large agency.

Who this whitepaper is for

Executives, e-commerce leads, and procurement teams awarding a Shopware 6 project who want to settle the agency question cleanly rather than by gut feeling — including the three questions that minimise risk regardless of the model.

The key figures

The scope covers the initial project plus 36 months of operation. All amounts are net model values (as of June 2026) based on market hourly rates and experience from real projects. Even under conservative assumptions, a TCO factor of around 1.8 remains — the result is robust against the assumptions.