Sharetribe vs a Custom Marketplace Build

What Sharetribe gives you and why Tepia says start there

Sharetribe is a hosted marketplace platform. You get listings, search, booking or ordering, messaging, reviews and Stripe based payments with commission, on a monthly subscription that scales with usage, and you can launch in days. Its no code tier covers a standard rental, service or product marketplace; its developer tier (the former Flex product) exposes APIs and a customizable front end for teams that can write code.

Tepia builds custom marketplaces and still tells most founders to start on Sharetribe. The hardest part of a marketplace is not software, it is liquidity: getting enough supply that buyers find what they want, and enough buyers that suppliers keep listing.

Use Sharetribe to prove the transaction loop. Then decide whether to build.

Decision framework: when a custom marketplace is the right call

Tepia uses the framework below in Discovery. Score your marketplace on each row; two or more rows in the right hand column usually mean it is time to build.

Tepia has built two sided and on demand products with Stripe Connect payouts, real time matching and native apps. The pattern across those projects is consistent: the founders who came from a platform with data in hand built the right thing the first time.

What a custom build from Tepia includes that Sharetribe does not

A custom marketplace is three products that share one backend: the demand side app, the supply side app and the operator console. Tepia designs each surface for its user instead of one interface serving everyone.

• Operator console. Matching rules, dispute resolution, payout control, fee configuration, fraud flags, analytics on liquidity by region and category.
• Matching and dispatch. For on demand categories, distance, capacity and rating based matching with notifications to both sides, the logic that makes a marketplace feel instant.

Tepia builds these on React and Node.js with PostgreSQL on AWS, native Swift and Kotlin or React Native for the apps, and REST and GraphQL APIs so partners and your own tools can plug in. See two sided marketplace app development and on demand app development for feature detail.

How Tepia approaches the migration from Sharetribe to custom

Tepia runs marketplace migrations through the same six phases as any build, with the migration itself treated as a first class workstream rather than a launch day afterthought.

1. Discovery. Tepia exports and analyzes your Sharetribe data (listings, users, transactions, reviews, messages), interviews power users on both sides, and reviews integrations such as Stripe, your CRM and analytics. Deliverables: Investigation Summary, Interview Summary and User Stories, plus a data map showing what migrates and what is archived.
2. Design. Design questionnaire, moodboards, style guide, detailed wireframes and sample designs for each of the three surfaces, informed by what your Sharetribe analytics show users actually do.
3. Development and Testing. Alpha and Beta schedules with functional, user acceptance and non functional tests, including a full rehearsal of the data migration and Stripe Connect account transfer. A Beta group of real sellers uses the new supply app while Sharetribe is still live.
4. Training. Hands on sessions for your operations team on the console: disputes, payouts, matching rules, fraud review.
5. Launch. Final migration, redirects from Sharetribe URLs to protect search rankings, coordinated messaging to both sides, and Tepia support reps on the rollout.

Tepia's honest summary

Start on Sharetribe if you have not yet proven that both sides will transact. Build custom with Tepia when the platform is what is holding back a marketplace that already works: the transaction model has outgrown it, native mobile and real time matching would change retention, payouts and trust need more than a commission, or the data has to live in your own systems.

Tepia will tell you which side of that line you are on in Discovery, and if the answer is stay, you will hear that too. Review Tepia’s portfolio, services and process, or contact Tepia with your current transaction volume and the features you are missing.

Frequently asked questions