Event ticketing with no per-ticket fees: what it changes for your business
By Kelsey Gilbert-Kreiling | Co-founder, Eventually
The short answer: With no per-ticket fees, your ticketing cost stays flat whether you sell 20 tickets or 2,000. Costs become predictable, you can price events for your community instead of a fee schedule, and growth stops costing you more. Payment processing still applies, but the tool itself stops taking a share of every ticket.
How per-ticket fees add up
Most ticketing platforms charge a percentage of each ticket, a fixed amount per ticket, or both. That's on top of payment processing. On any single ticket, the fee looks small enough to ignore.
That's the catch. Because each fee is small, very few event businesses ever add them up. And the total grows in step with your success: more dates, more guests, bigger bill.
Most of the hosts we interviewed built their audiences themselves, through Instagram, email, and partnerships with other brands. A per-ticket fee charges them for every guest they brought in on their own.
We broke down the real cost of Eventbrite fees for small events separately. Here, round numbers show the pattern.
A simple example
Say a platform charges 3% plus $1 per ticket. That's an illustrative rate, not any specific company's pricing. A studio runs 20 classes a month with 12 guests each, at $40 a ticket.
240 tickets a month brings in $9,600
3% of that is $288, plus $240 in fixed per-ticket fees
Total: $528 a month, or $6,336 a year, before processing
Now the studio does well and grows to 40 classes a month. Fees double too, to $1,056 a month. A flat subscription costs exactly the same at 240 tickets or 480.
Fixed per-ticket fees also hit low prices hardest. A $1 fee is 1% of a $100 workshop and 10% of a $10 community class.
What no per-ticket fees changes for your business
Your costs are predictable
You know what ticketing will cost before the month starts. Busy season doesn't come with a surprise bill.
Growth stops costing more
Add a Saturday session, open a second room, run a bigger annual party. The extra revenue stays with you.
You can price for your community
Sliding-scale tickets, $10 community nights, and free open houses make sense again when a fixed fee isn't eating a big slice of each one.
Checkout doesn't grow a fee line
Many businesses pass per-ticket fees on to guests, which means the price jumps at the last step of checkout. Without per-ticket fees, the price you list can be the price guests pay.
Group and bundle tickets work better
When every ticket carries a fee, a group of six costs you six fees. Flat pricing lets you offer group rates and bundles without watching the margin disappear.
What you still pay
No per-ticket fees doesn't mean no costs, and it's worth being clear about that.
Payment processing still applies through your processor, like Squarespace Payments or Stripe.
Your Squarespace plan may have its own Commerce terms, so check your plan details.
The subscription itself is a fixed monthly cost.
The difference is what kind of cost it is. A flat subscription works like your website plan: a tool, not a tax on every sale.
How to tell if flat pricing makes sense for you
1. Pull your fee history. Download three to twelve months of payouts or fee reports from your current ticketing tool.
2. Separate platform fees from processing. Processing stays with any tool. Platform fees are the part that goes away.
3. Find your average and your peak. Note a typical month and your busiest one.
4. Compare against a flat plan. Use your peak month, since that's where per-ticket fees cost the most.
5. Be honest about volume. If you run one or two small events a year, per-ticket pricing may cost less. Flat pricing pays off when events are a regular part of your business.
How Eventually handles pricing
Eventually is event ticketing for calendar-centric businesses, built as a Squarespace-first extension. It charges a flat monthly subscription, with no per-ticket fees and no percentage of ticket revenue.
Events sync to Squarespace Commerce as service products, and tickets sell as variants. Payments go through your own Squarespace Payments or Stripe account, so money moves from your guest to you. Eventually never sits in the middle of it.
There's a free plan to start, and paid plans stay flat as you add events and guests. You can compare plans at eventuallyticketing.com.
What to do right now
If you've never added up your fees: Pull last year's reports this week. Knowing the real number changes how you plan.
If you pass fees on to guests: Walk through your own checkout as a guest and watch what happens to the price at the last step.
If you run low-cost or free community events: Work out fees as a percentage of your ticket price. That number shows how much the fee model is shaping your pricing.
If you only run a few events a year: Per-ticket pricing may be fine for now. Revisit it when you start adding dates.
The bottom line
Per-ticket fees charge you the most for the part of your business that's working. Every new date and every extra guest adds to the bill.
Craig Silver, owner of Sous, works with small operators and described the stakes in a line we keep coming back to: often "the only thing between them and revenue is the right tool."
A ticketing tool should cost the same whether ten people come or a hundred. You did the work of bringing them together, and what they pay should stay yours.
Keep reading:
→ The Real Cost of Eventbrite Fees for Small Events
→ Event Ticketing for Nonprofits on Squarespace: Protect Your Revenue
See it in action:
Keep what your events earn
Flat monthly pricing, no per-ticket fees, and checkout through your own Squarespace site. Get started at eventuallyticketing.com.