Shopify launched in 2006. WooCommerce followed in 2011. By 2015, a functional online store could be operational in under a day for less than 300 dollars per year. The barrier to having a store dropped dramatically. The barrier to running a profitable one did not move at the same rate.
Customer acquisition costs from 2012 to 2024
Facebook advertising for ecommerce was inexpensive and highly targeted between 2012 and 2017. Merchants who entered during that window built businesses on ad economics that no longer exist. iOS 14.5 in 2021 disrupted attribution tracking, which raised effective customer acquisition costs across the industry. Many merchants who entered after 2019 never experienced the lower-cost environment and are competing in a significantly different landscape.
The infrastructure illusion
When tools become accessible, the public narrative tends to focus on what has been removed as a barrier. What gets less attention is what remains. Logistics, return management, supplier relationships, and cash flow timing are not solved by a Shopify subscription. A founder who spent six months building a store and six weeks learning to run it can still fail on unit economics that were never viable.
The ecommerce fatality rate is not tracked centrally, but platform data that has leaked from Shopify over the years suggests a significant majority of stores generate minimal revenue within the first two years.
Where the margin actually lives in ecommerce
Repeat purchase rate and average order value are more predictive of ecommerce viability than traffic volume. Neither is addressed by store-building tools.