Build Your eCommerce MVP in 6 Weeks
Greta builds eCommerce MVPs faster and cheaper than any traditional agency. Custom online stores, multi-vendor platforms, and D2C brands — delivered in 6 weeks. Stripe payments, inventory management, and analytics dashboards included from day one.
No months of waiting. No six-figure price tags. You have the products and the idea. We build the store — starting from a lean MVP that takes real orders, so you learn from real customers, not guesswork.
6 weeks
delivery time
Stripe
payments built-in
Inventory
management included
£12k
starting price
What is an eCommerce MVP — in plain English?
Imagine you want to open a bakery. You could spend a year fitting out a full restaurant, hiring a full team, and building a booking system. Or you could set up a market stall on Saturday, sell 50 loaves, and find out which flavours people actually buy. An eCommerce MVP is the market stall version of your online store. You build just enough to take real orders and learn from real customers — before spending a fortune on a full platform you might later need to redesign entirely.
In practical terms, an eCommerce MVP is a working online store with three things: a product catalogue (a list of what you sell), a shopping cart (where customers choose items), and a checkout (where they pay). That is it. No loyalty programme, no personalised recommendations, no AI chatbot. Just: browse, add to cart, pay. These three things are enough to make real sales and answer the most important question in any business — will people actually buy this?
Most eCommerce founders make the expensive mistake of trying to build the perfect store on day one. They spend six months and £80,000 adding every feature they can imagine — wishlists, product reviews, referral codes, abandoned cart emails, a loyalty scheme, a mobile app. Then they launch and discover that customers only needed a clean product page and a reliable checkout. An MVP avoids that. You build the essential shopping experience first, get your first 100 customers, and then add features that your actual buyers ask for.
Working with a specialist MVP development agency like Greta means you get a production-ready store — not a prototype — in 6 weeks. Stripe payments (Stripe is the company that handles the actual money moving from your customer's bank to yours), inventory tracking, and a reporting dashboard so you can see exactly what is selling. The analogy we use internally: we build the shop, stock the shelves, and hand you the keys. What you sell is up to you.
BUILD IT FAST
Ready to launch your online store?
Greta builds eCommerce MVPs in 6 weeks — Stripe payments, inventory, and analytics included from day one.
TALK TO A FOUNDER
Not sure where to start?
Book a 20-minute call. We'll map out your scope, tech stack, and go-to-market plan — for free.
5 signs you need an eCommerce MVP right now
Not sure if an MVP is the right approach for your online store? Here are the five clearest signs that building a lean eCommerce MVP is exactly what you need.
- 1
You are still selling through Instagram DMs or bank transfers
If you are manually taking orders through social media messages or asking customers to bank-transfer you money, you have a business — you just do not have a store yet. An eCommerce MVP gives you a real checkout in 6 weeks. Customers stop dropping off because the buying process is too clunky.
- 2
You have been waiting months for a quote from an agency
Traditional eCommerce agencies take 4 to 9 months to build and charge £40,000 to £150,000. If you have been quoted that and it feels wrong for where you are, it is because it is wrong. Greta builds the same working store in 6 weeks from £12,000.
- 3
You are trying to validate a new product or market
You have a product idea but you are not 100% sure there is enough demand to justify a full investment. An eCommerce MVP lets you find out with real orders — not a survey, not a landing page, but actual sales.
- 4
You are moving off Etsy, Amazon, or Shopify and want your own store
Marketplace platforms take commission on every sale and own the customer relationship. A custom eCommerce MVP gives you your own store, your own customer data, and full control over pricing — without paying Etsy or Amazon a cut forever.
- 5
You need a working store to show investors or raise a pre-seed round
Investors want to see traction — real orders, real customers, real revenue. A polished but lightweight eCommerce MVP with a few months of sales data is far more convincing than a pitch deck. Greta builds investor-ready stores fast.
Ready to build?
Let's bring your idea to life. Fast, affordable, and production-ready.
Real examples: what Greta has built
Here are three realistic examples of eCommerce MVPs Greta has built — the kind of projects we work on every month. Names and details are illustrative but the scopes and timelines are real.
Helia Naturals
D2C Skincare Brand
Timeline
5 weeks
Budget
£14,000
Helia was selling through Instagram with bank transfers. The founder had 800 followers and consistent DM orders but no real store. We built a 40-product D2C store with Stripe checkout, inventory management, and a simple admin dashboard. In the first 3 weeks after launch, Helia processed 140 orders — more than the previous 3 months of manual sales. The founder could see exactly which products were selling, where customers dropped off in checkout, and which traffic sources converted best.
TradeNest
B2B Trade Marketplace
Timeline
8 weeks
Budget
£22,000
TradeNest wanted to build a B2B marketplace connecting independent furniture makers with interior designers. We built a multi-vendor platform where 30 maker accounts could list products, set trade pricing, and manage their own orders. Buyers (interior designers) got trade accounts with net-30 payment terms. Stripe Connect handled automatic payouts to each maker when an order shipped. The platform launched with 12 makers and 45 buyers in the first month.
Cratewell
Subscription Box Service
Timeline
6 weeks
Budget
£16,000
Cratewell curates monthly boxes of independent bookshop picks. They needed a subscription checkout, recurring billing, a member portal where subscribers could pause or cancel, and an admin tool to manage fulfilment. We built all of that on Stripe Billing with a clean storefront. They launched with 3 subscription tiers — monthly, quarterly, and annual — and hit 200 active subscribers in 6 weeks. The founder could manage the entire fulfilment process from one admin screen.
What eCommerce products does Greta build?
D2C brand stores
Direct-to-consumer stores for product brands selling without retail or marketplace intermediaries. Full control over pricing, branding, and the customer relationship. Greta builds D2C stores for food, fashion, beauty, and physical product brands.
Multi-vendor marketplaces
Platforms where multiple sellers list products and manage their own inventory. Stripe Connect handles split payments between the platform and each seller automatically. See our dedicated marketplace MVP page for more detail.
Subscription boxes
Recurring subscription commerce with plan management, payment retry logic, pause and cancel flows, and a member portal for customers to manage their subscription. Stripe Billing handles all recurring charges.
Digital product stores
Stores for software licences, templates, ebooks, courses, and other downloadable products. Instant delivery, licence key generation, and download limits built in. Works for solo creators and software companies alike.
B2B trade portals
Wholesale and trade portals with account-based pricing, minimum order quantities, purchase orders, and net payment terms for business buyers. Great for manufacturers and distributors moving online.
Headless eCommerce
Custom front-end experience connected to a headless commerce backend. Full flexibility over design while keeping payments and inventory in a reliable system. Works well for brands that need highly custom shopping experiences.
What is included in a Greta eCommerce MVP?
Every eCommerce MVP from Greta ships with the full commercial layer — not just a front-end mockup. Payments, inventory, and a custom dashboard for order analytics are included by default. Here is what you get out of the box.
What it includes: Stripe integration with card, Apple Pay, Google Pay, and BACS direct debit. Refunds and dispute handling configured. 3D Secure authentication (the extra verification step some banks require) handled automatically.
Why it matters: Stripe is the most reliable and developer-friendly payments platform. It handles PCI compliance — meaning you never have to touch raw card numbers or worry about the security audits that come with that.
What it includes: Product catalogue, variants (like size or colour options), stock levels, low-stock alerts, and backorder handling. CSV import for bulk product uploads when you have a large catalogue.
Why it matters: Knowing exactly what you have in stock — and getting an alert before you run out — prevents the most common early eCommerce disaster: selling items you cannot fulfil.
What it includes: Order dashboard, fulfilment status tracking, tracking number entry, automatic customer email notifications, and returns management.
Why it matters: A clear order workflow is the difference between a chaotic first month and a smooth one. Customers know where their order is without emailing you.
What it includes: Sales dashboard, conversion funnel (showing where customers drop off), top-selling products, abandoned cart tracking, and customer lifetime value. Google Analytics 4 and Meta Pixel wired up on day one.
Why it matters: You cannot improve what you cannot measure. Analytics from day one means your first month of trading data is already useful for making decisions.
BUILD IT FAST
Want Stripe, inventory and analytics in your store?
Every Greta eCommerce MVP ships with the full commercial layer. Book a free discovery call.
TALK TO A FOUNDER
Not sure where to start?
Book a 20-minute call. We'll map out your scope, tech stack, and go-to-market plan — for free.
Common mistakes founders make when building an eCommerce MVP
We have seen hundreds of eCommerce projects. These are the mistakes that eat up budgets and delay launches — and how to avoid them.
Building every feature before the first sale
The number one mistake. Founders spend months adding loyalty points, personalised recommendations, wishlists, and gift wrapping before they have a single paying customer. None of those features matter until you have validated that people will buy at all. Build the checkout first. Everything else comes after real orders.
Using the wrong platform for the wrong stage
Shopify (the most popular hosted eCommerce platform) is great for testing a simple product catalogue. But it charges transaction fees, limits what you can customise at checkout, and becomes expensive fast as you add apps. A custom MVP costs more upfront but gives you full control and no ongoing fees. The right choice depends on where you are — and we help you figure that out on the first call.
Not testing payments before launch
Nothing loses a customer faster than a broken checkout. We have seen stores go live with payment errors that only appeared on certain bank cards or in certain countries. Greta tests every payment scenario — successful payment, declined card, 3D Secure authentication, refund — before any store goes live.
Ignoring mobile from the start
More than 70% of eCommerce browsing happens on mobile. If your store was designed on a desktop computer and never tested on a phone, a huge proportion of your customers will have a broken experience. Every Greta eCommerce MVP is mobile-first and tested across devices before launch.
Building without analytics from day one
Launching without Google Analytics or Meta Pixel installed means your first weeks of customer data are lost forever. You cannot go back and add it retroactively. Greta wires up analytics before the first order is taken, so from day one you know where your customers came from and where they dropped off.
How Greta builds your eCommerce MVP — step by step
Our process is the same for every project. No surprises, no scope creep, no disappearing for 3 months. Here is exactly what happens from the day you book a call to the day your store goes live. Think of it like building a house: you would not pour the foundation before you had the architect's drawings — we work the same way.
- 01
Discovery call (1 hour)
We learn about your products, your customers, and your market. We map the core shopping experience together and agree on which payment methods, fulfilment model, and third-party tools (like shipping integrations) you need. You leave with a clear picture of what the MVP will include.
- 02
Scope and stack review
We turn that discovery conversation into a written scope document — exactly what we will build, in what order, and at what price. You review and approve before a single line of code is written. No hidden costs. No surprises at the end.
- 03
Design and prototype (3–5 days)
Clickable mockups so you can see the full shopping journey — homepage, category page, product page, add to cart, checkout, confirmation email — before any code is written. You give feedback. We adjust. Usually 1 or 2 rounds of changes. Then we build.
- 04
Build (5–6 weeks)
Our AI-assisted platform builds your store. Stripe, inventory, and order management are wired up and working. You get weekly updates and a private staging environment (a private version of your store that only you can see) to review progress as we go.
- 05
QA and payment testing
Every checkout flow tested across desktop, tablet, and mobile. Every payment scenario — successful payment, card decline, refund, 3DS authentication — verified. Core Web Vitals (Google's measure of page speed) checked and optimised before launch.
- 06
Launch and handover
Your store goes live. You receive full code ownership, documentation, and a handover call walking you through the admin panel. GA4, Meta Pixel, and Google Shopping feed set up. No ongoing dependency on Greta unless you want continued support.
eCommerce MVP cost and timeline comparison — 2026
Here is how Greta compares to the alternatives for building your first online store. If you want to explore building without code at all, read our no-code MVP development guide.
| Option | Cost | Timeline | You own the code? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Traditional agency | £40,000–£150,000 | 4–9 months | Usually yes, eventually |
| Freelancer | £10,000–£40,000 | 2–6 months | Yes, but high risk |
| No-code tools (Shopify, etc.) | £29–£299/month + apps | Days to weeks | No — platform lock-in |
| No-code custom build | £5,000–£15,000 | 4–8 weeks | Partial |
| Greta | From £12,000 | 6 weeks | Yes — 100% yours |
Prices are estimates for a comparable eCommerce MVP with Stripe payments, inventory management, and an admin panel.
Who is eCommerce MVP development for?
Greta works with a specific type of founder and business. Here is who gets the most from working with us. If you recognise yourself in any of these, it is worth booking a free call to talk through your project.
Product founders
You have a physical product or range and you want your own store — not to share your customer data and margin with Amazon, Etsy, or another marketplace.
Marketplace builders
You want to connect buyers and sellers in a specific niche. Think trade marketplaces, specialist product categories, or community-driven commerce. See our marketplace MVP service.
SaaS or digital product founders
You sell software, templates, or digital downloads and need a reliable store with licence key delivery and instant download links. Works alongside a B2B SaaS MVP if you also have a web app.
Mobile commerce founders
You want a shopping experience that feels native on a phone. Greta builds mobile-first eCommerce MVPs. If you also need a dedicated app, see our mobile app MVP service.
BUILD IT FAST
Want a full scope in 20 minutes?
Tell us your eCommerce idea — we will map the MVP scope, payment setup, and timeline on one free call.
TALK TO A FOUNDER
Not sure where to start?
Book a 20-minute call. We'll map out your scope, tech stack, and go-to-market plan — for free.
eCommerce MVP — common questions answered
What is an eCommerce MVP?+
An eCommerce MVP is the first working version of your online store — product catalogue, shopping cart, checkout, and payments — without every feature you could imagine adding. Think of it like a pop-up market stall version of your dream shop. It is complete enough to take real money from real customers, but lean enough to build in weeks rather than months. You use it to find out whether people will actually buy your product, at your price, through your store — before spending a year and a fortune building a full platform.
How long does it take to build an eCommerce MVP?+
With Greta, most eCommerce MVPs are delivered in 6 weeks. A simple D2C store with under 50 products and a standard Stripe checkout can be done in 4 weeks. A multi-vendor marketplace with seller dashboards, Stripe Connect payouts, and an admin moderation layer takes around 8 weeks. Traditional agencies take 4 to 9 months for the same scope. Greta is faster because we use our own AI-assisted build platform and a team that has built hundreds of eCommerce projects.
Does Greta integrate Stripe payments?+
Yes. Every eCommerce MVP Greta builds includes Stripe (the most widely used online payments platform in the world) for payment processing. We implement card payments, Apple Pay (the one-tap payment on iPhones), Google Pay, and refund workflows. For multi-vendor platforms, we set up Stripe Connect, which automatically splits and routes payments to individual sellers. Stripe handles PCI compliance — that is the security standard for handling card payments — so you never have to touch raw card numbers or worry about a security audit.
What is a D2C MVP?+
D2C stands for direct-to-consumer. It means selling directly to your end customer through your own store, without going through a retailer or a marketplace like Amazon or Etsy. A D2C MVP is the first version of that own store. You keep 100% of the margin (no platform commission), you own the customer data, and you control the entire shopping experience. Greta builds D2C stores for food and drink brands, beauty brands, fashion labels, subscription services, and physical product startups of all kinds.
How much does eCommerce MVP development cost?+
eCommerce MVP development at Greta starts from £12,000 for a simple D2C store with Stripe checkout, inventory management, and an admin dashboard. A multi-vendor marketplace or a subscription platform starts from £18,000. Traditional agencies charge £40,000 to £150,000 for the same scope. Greta is faster and cheaper because we use our own AI-assisted development platform rather than billing every hour of custom work at agency rates. Book a free call and we will give you a real price within 48 hours.
Can Greta build a multi-vendor marketplace MVP?+
Yes. Greta builds multi-vendor marketplace MVPs where multiple sellers can list products, manage their own inventory, and receive automatic payouts. We use Stripe Connect (Stripe's tool for platforms that handle money on behalf of other businesses) for split payments between the platform and each seller. We also build seller onboarding flows, seller dashboards, and admin tools for moderating listings and resolving disputes. Visit our marketplace MVP development page for the full detail.
Do I own the code after Greta builds my eCommerce MVP?+
Yes. You own 100% of the code, the database, and all intellectual property from the moment we hand over. There is no lock-in, no ongoing licence fee, and no dependency on Greta infrastructure. You can host your store wherever you want — AWS, Vercel, DigitalOcean — and bring in any developer to continue the work. This is one of the key differences between a custom MVP and a hosted platform like Shopify, where you are renting the software rather than owning it.
What is the difference between a custom eCommerce build and Shopify?+
Shopify is a hosted platform — you rent access to their software and pay a transaction fee on every sale (between 0.5% and 2% depending on your plan). Shopify Plus, the enterprise tier, costs $2,300 per month. You cannot fully customise the checkout experience without paying for Shopify Plus, and complex custom logic usually requires buying and maintaining multiple third-party apps. A custom eCommerce MVP built by Greta gives you complete control over the user experience, checkout flow, data, and pricing logic. For most early-stage founders, a custom MVP from Greta costs less in year one than the Shopify Plus plan plus the apps needed to replicate the same functionality — and you own it forever.
Does Greta build mobile apps for eCommerce?+
Greta builds progressive web apps (PWAs — websites that behave like apps on a mobile phone without needing an app store download) for eCommerce MVPs by default. These work on all devices including iOS and Android without needing an app store submission or Apple developer account. For businesses that specifically need a native iOS or Android shopping app, we offer that as a separate engagement — see our mobile app MVP development page. Most eCommerce MVPs do not need a native app at the MVP stage.
Sources & references
Official documentation and research cited on this page.
Stripe — eCommerce Payments Documentation
Official Stripe developer docs for payments, subscriptions, Stripe Connect, and refunds. The definitive reference for anyone building online payments.
Baymard Institute — eCommerce UX Benchmarks
The world's largest eCommerce UX research library — checkout abandonment rates, cart behaviour, and product page benchmarks from real user testing.
Google Merchant Center — Developer Guide
Official Google Merchant Center and Shopping feed documentation for syndicating product data to Google Search and Shopping.
Statista — Global eCommerce Revenue Data
Annual global eCommerce revenue statistics and growth forecasts, including mobile commerce and D2C brand trend data.
Related services
Explore other MVP and development services from Greta.
MVP Development Agency
Our core MVP development service for all product types and industries.
Marketplace MVP
Multi-vendor marketplace builds with Stripe Connect split payments.
Mobile App MVP
Native iOS and Android MVP builds for mobile-first products.
B2B SaaS MVP
Fast B2B software product builds with subscription billing.
No-Code MVP
Build your MVP faster using no-code and low-code tools.
Dashboard Development
Custom analytics and reporting dashboards for your business.
Launch your online store in 6 weeks with Greta.
You have the products and the idea. We have the platform. Stripe payments, inventory management, and analytics included. Real store, real orders, real customers — in weeks, not months.
Whether you are building a D2C brand, a multi-vendor marketplace, or a subscription service, Greta has built it before. We are a specialist MVP development agency — eCommerce is one of our core verticals, not an afterthought.
Free 30-minute discovery call. Real pricing within 48 hours. No sales pressure.