Quoted projects - fixed, in writing

Ecommerce website design and development

I build online shops. Not as one service on a long agency menu - as project work I quote in writing, build myself, and look after once it's live.

First Ideas is a one-person studio in Ogbourne St George, near Marlborough in Wiltshire, and I've been building for the web for more than twenty years. When you ask me for a quote, the person who writes it is the person who builds the shop. There's no account manager in between, and no junior you've never met doing the work.

Most ecommerce agencies won't tell you what anything costs until you've booked a call. I'll give you a fixed quote in writing before any work starts, and the price on the quote is the price you pay.

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The Cookie Kitchen Ecommerce

A shop I built: The Cookie Kitchen

The Cookie Kitchen is a small-batch bakery. They didn't need a standard product grid - their whole business is customers picking their own mix, so I designed the brand and built the shop around a custom box builder: choose your box size, fill it with your flavours, check out. Brand, design, WooCommerce build, payment handling and the builder itself, all one piece of work.

That's the kind of ecommerce I like: a shop shaped around how the business actually sells, rather than the business reshaped to fit a template.

You can see it alongside the rest of the work at the work gallery, which runs from village businesses to global platforms.

What I build

Shops shaped around how you actually sell - not templates with the colours changed.

WooCommerce shops. WordPress plus WooCommerce is still the most flexible way for most UK businesses to sell online: you own the site, there's no platform taking a monthly cut, and it can grow in any direction. I build custom themes, not purchased templates with the colours changed.

Custom product builders. Box builders, configurators, made-to-order flows - anything where "add to basket" isn't the whole story.

Checkout work. Custom checkout flows, basket logic, discounts and shipping rules that match how you actually price and post things.

Payments and fulfilment. Stripe and PayPal integration, subscriptions and repeat orders, shipping and fulfilment logic, order notifications that reach the right person.

Connections to the systems behind the shop. Orders pushed into your CRM or accounts package, stock kept in sync, intake and quote forms feeding the same pipeline. I've built CRM, ERP and API integrations around ecommerce for years - if your orders currently get retyped into another system by hand, that's usually the first thing worth fixing. Xero and QuickBooks on the accounts side, Klaviyo, Mailchimp and Omnisend for email, Zendesk for support, GA4 and Google Tag Manager for conversion tracking - and dozens more. If it has an API, it can talk to your shop.

The regulated side. I've built and run ecommerce and content platforms in healthcare and other regulated areas - including MMJ.com and the Medispress telehealth build - where what you're allowed to say and sell is tightly controlled. If your products come with rules attached, I've worked under rules before.

How a project runs

We talk.

You tell me what you sell, how you sell it, and what's not working now. A rough brief is fine.

I scope it.

I put the whole job in writing: pages, features, integrations, what's in and what's out.

You get a fixed quote.

In writing, before anything is built. If something changes mid-project, the quote changes in writing too - no surprise invoices.

Built on staging you can watch.

You see the real shop taking shape and test it yourself, rather than waiting for a big reveal.

Launch.

Payments tested, orders tested, redirects in place so you keep any Google rankings you already have.

Afterwards.

Hosting, maintenance and changes can carry on with me - see website care - or I hand everything over cleanly. Your choice.

What does an ecommerce website cost?

The market context is public, so it's here - and your number arrives fixed, in writing.

Honestly: it depends on the shop, which is why I quote each one. But the market context is public, so here it is. Standard UK ecommerce builds are commonly quoted anywhere from about £2,500 to £20,000 and beyond, depending on who you ask and what's included.

What moves the number up or down:

How many products, and how complicated they are. Fifty simple products is a small job. Five thousand products with variations, or made-to-order items, is not.
Custom functionality. A product builder or unusual checkout costs more than a standard catalogue.
Integrations. Each system the shop has to talk to (accounts, CRM, fulfilment) adds scoped work.
Content and photography. Arriving with good product photos and descriptions saves real money.

Tell me those four things and I can usually give you a ballpark on the first call, then a fixed written quote once it's scoped.

One thing I'd rather say now than after you've read the whole page: my £30-a-month website plan doesn't include online shops. Ecommerce is proper project work, and this is the right page for it.

Why one developer instead of an agency?

Because you deal with the person doing the work. Questions get answered by someone who knows the code, decisions get made in one conversation, and nothing is lost between a salesperson, a project manager and a build team. My overheads are a desk in a Wiltshire village, which shows up in the quote.

The trade-off is honest too: there's one of me, so I take on a sensible number of projects and tell you a realistic timeline up front rather than promising everything at once.

Common questions

Straight answers, no sales layer. Something specific to your shop?

Ask a question

How much does an ecommerce website cost in the UK?

Typical quotes in the UK run from roughly £2,500 for a straightforward shop to £20,000+ for large or complex ones. I give a fixed written quote for your specific shop before any work starts, so you're never guessing.

WooCommerce or Shopify?

I build on WooCommerce and custom platforms. WooCommerce means you own the shop outright and pay no platform fees; Shopify is a rented platform with a monthly cost and transaction fees, but less to maintain. If Shopify is genuinely the better fit for you, I'll say so rather than sell you the wrong thing.

Who owns the shop once it's built?

You do. The site, the content and the domain are yours, and if we part ways you keep all of it - your domain and content go with you, along with a full copy of the files.

Can you rebuild my existing shop?

Yes. Rebuilds are a big part of what I do - keeping your products, customers and Google rankings while replacing what's underneath. See website redesign.

Can you connect the shop to my accounts or CRM system?

Usually, yes. That's scoped and quoted like everything else: tell me what system, and I'll tell you what's involved.

How long does an ecommerce build take?

It depends on scope, so the timeline goes in the written quote alongside the price. What I won't do is promise a date on this page to every visitor at once.

Do you work with businesses outside Wiltshire?

Yes. I'm in Ogbourne St George and most work happens remotely - clients are across the UK and beyond.

What happens after launch?

Up to you. Many clients keep me on for hosting, maintenance and changes; some take everything in-house. Both are fine, and the handover is clean either way.

★★★★★

"Gordon created a beautiful website from scratch for my baking business. From the start he was so helpful, explaining everything to me and making my vision come to life. He set up a payment system on my website where customers could purchase my bakes online and pay for them, and my sales went up very significantly since having my website."

Libby · 5.0 on Google

Tell me what you sell.

A rough brief is enough to start a quote - you'll get me, not a sales team.

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