How the planner calculates.
Every result starts with your inputs and a named fee schedule. Here is what happens in between.
One month, one product, one-time payments
Orders means initial paid orders, before refunds. Each order contains one item at the same price and discount. All figures are USD. This model is designed for a planning scenario; it does not reproduce bank settlement timing, mixed baskets, subscriptions or an accounting ledger.
The calculation, step by step
- Charged price = list price × (1 − discount rate), rounded to cents.
- Initial sales = charged price × initial orders.
- Refunded revenue = initial sales × expected refund rate.
- Transaction fees = platform fees + processor fees, adjusted by the refund fee-retention assumption.
- Variable operating costs = initial orders × (delivery/support cost + acquisition cost).
- Monthly fixed costs = overhead + platform plan + creation cost ÷ recovery months.
- Monthly profit = initial sales − refunds − transaction fees − variable costs − fixed costs.
Fee retention and rounding
Each platform and processor per-order fee is rounded separately to cents before multiplying by orders. Forecasted refund adjustments can produce fractional cents, retained internally until display. Modeled fees are multiplied by [1 − refund rate × (1 − retention rate)]. A 100% retention assumption leaves fees charged on all initial orders, even if revenue is refunded. This is deliberately editable.
Gumroad’s direct-sales tier
At a uniform charged price, the first ceiling(20,000 ÷ charged price) orders use the 10% platform rate; subsequent orders use 5%. Fixed platform fees and separate processing still apply. This assumes the month starts at zero sales and refunds occur after sales. Other products, refund timing and custom fee schedules can change your real threshold. Discover is excluded.
Break-even and target price
Break-even searches for the first whole initial-order count that covers modeled monthly costs, including any applicable fee tier. The search is capped at one million orders. Target price searches cent-level prices up to $1 million with your forecast volume unchanged. “Not reachable” means the current assumptions or search limits prevent a result; it does not mean no real business model is possible.
Margins and cash flow
Net margin is modeled profit divided by revenue remaining after refunds. Effective transaction fee rate uses initial sales as the denominator. They are different ratios. Creation-cost recovery is an allocation: it is not a prediction of cash payout, and it is not a tax deduction calculation.
What the model does not include
Income tax, customer sales taxes and their effect on processing fees, payout charges, currency conversion, chargebacks, reserves, affiliate commissions, additional paid platform products and eligibility rules are outside the presets. Add known extra operating expenses yourself. Stripe’s lower fee does not make it equivalent to a storefront or merchant of record.
See Stripe , Gumroad , Lemon Squeezy and Payhip for current provider terms.