Cottage Food Platform Comparison (2026): Fees, Features & the Cheapest Way to Sell

There are more ways than ever to sell cottage food and homemade food online, and the platforms market themselves hard. The pitch you will hear most in 2026 is that a flat monthly fee beats a percentage fee. That is half the story. The full question is simpler: what do you actually pay to be live, and what do you keep on each sale? Here is the honest breakdown, including the option most of these comparisons leave out.

1. What actually matters

Strip away the marketing and four things decide your real cost and whether you actually get orders:

• Monthly cost: what you pay to stay live, even in a slow month.
• Seller fee per order: the cut taken out of your payout (separate from card processing).
• Built-in payments: does it handle checkout and cards, or are you chasing Venmo?
• Discovery: does the platform bring you new customers, or do you have to bring all of them yourself?

The flat-fee crowd is right that percentage fees can add up. But a flat fee is still a fee you pay before you have sold a thing. The cheapest setup is the one that costs nothing until you get paidand still gets you discovered. Keep that in mind as you read the table.

2. The comparison table

Pricing reflects each platform's published plans as of 2026 and can change, confirm current details before deciding. Chefry plate and menu orders are 0% commission to the seller; a 5% customer service fee and standard Stripe processing (2.9% + 30¢) apply, and service bookings carry a 15% commission.

3. Platform-by-platform rundown

Chefry, best value (free + 0% on plates)

Chefry is free to start with no monthly fee, and plate and menu orders are 0% commission to the seller, so you keep the full sale price. On top of the storefront and built-in payments, you get a real customer marketplace, a native iOS and Android app with push notifications for your drops, pre-orders, and the option to add catering, private chef bookings, and meal prep from the same profile. Payouts are daily and escrow-backed.

Best for: anyone who wants to pay nothing until they earn, get discovered, and have room to grow past cottage food. Trade-off: it is a newer marketplace, so in some areas you will still supplement with your own marketing early on.

Homegrown, best simple flat-fee storefront

Homegrown is a clean, food-specific storefront with local pickup scheduling and a vendor directory, for about $10 a month (roughly $12.50 month-to-month). If all you want is a tidy local-pickup page and you do not mind paying monthly, it does that well. The catch is the flat fee runs whether you sell or not, and there is no native app. See our full Chefry vs Homegrown comparison.

Bakesy, for bakers who invoice

Bakesy ($9.99 to $17.99/month) is built around bakery order forms and invoicing. The important caveat: it does not include built-in payments, you collect through Venmo, Zelle, or PayPal directly, which means no chargeback protection and more manual reconciliation. Good for organizing custom-order bakers, less ideal if you want true online checkout.

Castiron, no longer an option

Castiron was acquired, rebranded as Nourysh, and wound down, its storefronts are offline as of 2026. If you were a Castiron seller, here is where to move your food business.

Square & Shopify, powerful but generic

Square Online (free plan plus standard processing) and Shopify ($39/month plus processing) are capable e-commerce tools, but neither is built for home food. There is no cottage-food compliance help and no built-in discovery, so you bring every customer yourself. Shopify in particular is more platform than a local home cook selling 20 to 40 items a week needs.

Facebook & Cottage.menu, the bring-your-own-audience tier

Facebook Marketplace and groups are free and where many cooks start, but there is no real checkout, no menu structure, and orders live in DMs (here is a better way to sell off Facebook). Cottage.menu is a simple menu-link builder, fine if you already have customers and just need a link, but it does not bring you new ones.

4. Our verdict

We are Chefry, so weigh this accordingly, but here is the honest call:

• Best overall value: Chefry, free to start, 0% on plates, marketplace, app, and room to grow.
• Best simple paid storefront: Homegrown, if you only want a basic pickup page and prefer a flat fee.
• Best for invoice-based bakers: Bakesy, just know you handle payments yourself.
• Already have an audience and just need a link: Cottage.menu or a Facebook group.

For most people the math is straightforward: why pay $120 or more a year to be live when you can start free, keep 100% of every plate, and still get discovered? Create your free Chefry profile and get your menu live today. New to selling? Start with a low-risk weekend side hustle and test demand first.

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