Shopify vs Faire comes down to one question: do you want to find wholesale buyers, or do you want to own them? Faire has 700,000+ retailers browsing its marketplace. Shopify just opened native B2B features to every paid plan. If you're a brand considering wholesale for the first time — or rethinking where your wholesale orders come from — you're choosing between two very different models.

One finds buyers for you and takes a cut. The other gives you full control but expects you to bring your own buyers. Pick wrong, and you'll either bleed margin on commissions or sit with a wholesale storefront nobody visits.

How Faire Actually Works (And What It Costs)

Faire is a wholesale marketplace. You list your products, and Faire's 700,000+ retail buyers can discover, browse, and order from you. The platform handles payments, offers retailers net-60 terms, and pays you within 1–3 business days regardless of when the retailer pays.

That convenience comes with a price:

15% commission on the product subtotal for all marketplace orders — both first orders and reorders from Faire-sourced retailers
Payment processing fees of 1.9%–3.5% plus $0.30 per transaction, depending on your payout speed
$10 new customer fee on a retailer's first order with your brand (one-time, Faire-sourced only)

On a typical first marketplace order, your effective fee rate lands between 18% and 22%. That's steep if your wholesale margins are already tight.

Faire Direct — where you bring your own retailers to the platform — charges 0% commission. But at that point, you're doing the sales work yourself and routing orders through Faire's infrastructure. The main benefit is Faire's net-60 terms and payment guarantee, which some retailers expect.

What Shopify B2B Gives You (On Every Plan)

As of April 2026, Shopify's native B2B features are available on Basic, Grow, and Advanced plans — not just Plus. You can now set up wholesale selling without a separate app or a $2,300/month Plus subscription.

What you get on standard plans:

Company profiles for wholesale buyers
Up to 3 custom catalogs with tailored pricing
Volume discounts and quantity rules
Vaulted credit cards for repeat orders
Payment terms (net 15, net 30, etc.)

Plus merchants get unlimited catalogs, per-customer pricing assignment, and partial payments. If you have fewer than a dozen wholesale accounts on similar terms, the standard plan features cover it. For a deeper walkthrough, see our Shopify B2B catalog setup guide.

The critical difference: Shopify charges zero commission on wholesale orders. You pay your regular Shopify subscription and payment processing — that's it. On a $500 wholesale order, Faire takes roughly $90–110 in fees. Shopify takes your standard payment processing rate, typically around $15.

Faire's Real Advantage: Buyer Discovery

Faire's value isn't its technology. It's the 700,000 retailers already there, browsing categories, placing orders, and looking for new brands to stock.

If you're a DTC brand with zero wholesale relationships, building a buyer list from scratch is slow. You'd need to cold-email stores, attend trade shows, or run outreach campaigns. Faire skips all of that. List your products, optimize your brand page, and retailers find you.

During Faire Market events, the average retailer orders from six brands. That's real discovery you can't replicate on your own Shopify B2B storefront, because nobody's browsing your wholesale catalog unless you've already told them it exists.

For brands entering wholesale with no existing retailer network, Faire's 15% commission is essentially a customer acquisition cost. Whether it's a good one depends on your margins and reorder rates.

Shopify's Real Advantage: Ownership and Margin

Every order through Faire is a Faire customer first and your customer second. You get the order, but Faire controls the relationship, the communication channel, and the buyer's browsing experience. If Faire changes its algorithm or fee structure, your wholesale revenue shifts with it.

Shopify B2B puts you in control. You own the buyer relationship, set your own terms, build your own catalog experience, and keep the margin. Merchants who adopt Shopify B2B report up to 33% more self-serve orders within six months and up to 20% higher reorder frequency, according to Shopify.

That ownership matters most for repeat business. Once a retailer has reordered from you three or four times, paying 15% commission on every order stops making financial sense. The relationship is established — you don't need Faire's discovery anymore.

The Hybrid Approach: Use Both (Strategically)

The best wholesale brands don't pick one platform. They use Faire for acquisition and Shopify for retention.

Step 1: List on Faire to get discovered. Let the marketplace do what it's good at — putting your products in front of retailers who've never heard of you. Accept the 15% commission as a cost of new customer acquisition.

Step 2: Move repeat buyers to Shopify B2B. After a retailer's second or third Faire order, reach out directly. Offer them a slightly better wholesale price (you can afford it — you're saving 15% in commission) and set them up on your Shopify B2B catalog with their own login and payment terms.

Step 3: Use Faire Direct for retailers who insist on the platform. Some retailers prefer Faire's net-60 terms and unified ordering. Faire Direct charges 0% commission on buyers you bring, so you keep your margin while giving retailers their preferred ordering experience.

This way, Faire is your top-of-funnel. Shopify is your long-term wholesale infrastructure. You pay for discovery once, then own the relationship going forward.

When Faire Isn't Worth It

Faire's commission structure works against you in a few scenarios:

Low-margin products. If your wholesale margin is under 40%, a combined 18–22% effective fee on first orders leaves almost nothing. You need fat margins to absorb Faire's cut and still profit.
High reorder rates from Faire-sourced buyers. If your retailers reorder monthly and you're still paying 15% each time, that's a recurring tax on established relationships. Move those buyers to your own channel.
You already have retail relationships. If you've got a list of 50 stores that already buy from you, putting them on Faire just adds a middleman. Set up Shopify B2B and keep the margin.

What Are the Limitations of Shopify B2B?

Shopify B2B has its own gaps:

No built-in buyer discovery. You need to drive traffic to your wholesale catalog yourself. If nobody knows your brand exists, a B2B storefront with zero visitors generates zero orders.
Three-catalog limit on standard plans. If you sell to different buyer segments with different pricing tiers, three catalogs might not cut it. You'll need Plus ($2,300/month) for unlimited catalogs and per-customer pricing.
No payment guarantee. Faire pays you in 1–3 days and absorbs the risk of retailer non-payment. On Shopify, you're managing payment terms and collections yourself.

Quick Comparison: Shopify vs Faire Side by Side

Commission: Faire charges 15% on marketplace orders. Shopify charges 0%.
Buyer discovery: Faire has 700,000+ active retailers browsing. Shopify has none — you bring your own.
Relationship ownership: Faire controls the buyer relationship. Shopify gives it to you.
Payment terms: Faire offers net-60 to retailers and pays brands in 1–3 days. Shopify lets you set custom terms but you manage collections.
Catalogs: Faire has unlimited product listings. Shopify standard plans cap at 3 catalogs (unlimited on Plus).
Best for: Faire wins at discovery and new buyer acquisition. Shopify wins at margin and long-term relationship ownership.

If you're running a Shopify store with an order form already optimized for conversions, adding a B2B catalog on the same store is straightforward — your product data, payment setup, and store infrastructure are already in place. If you're new to wholesale pricing, our guide on setting your first wholesale prices covers the margin math.

Start with Faire if you need buyers. Build on Shopify B2B as soon as you have them. The brands that grow wholesale profitably treat Faire as a launchpad, not a permanent home.