Custom or off-the-shelf software: how to choose, and what it costs over five years

The short answer: buy, unless

For processes that work the same in every business, off-the-shelf software is almost always the better choice. You don't need custom accounting, email, file storage or payroll. Thousands of companies share the same rules, and the vendor keeps the package up to date when legislation changes.

Custom software becomes interesting where your work differs from the average. Scheduling with your own rules, a quoting process that matches how you price work, or an operation where several teams and roles work together. That is where a standard package forces you to bend your way of working to the software, or to work around it with spreadsheets and email.

Five questions that settle the choice

1. Does your process work in the package without workarounds? If your team keeps a spreadsheet next to the package, re-types data or arranges things over email, you are paying for the software and for the workaround.
2. How many users are there, and is that growing? Off-the-shelf software usually charges per user per month. With five users that is manageable; with a growing team, or external parties who also need to log in, it adds up fast.
3. Does this process set you apart? If the way you schedule, quote or deliver is the reason clients pick you, you don't want it in the same straitjacket as your competitor's.
4. How many systems need to talk to each other? Every place where someone copies data from one system into another costs time and causes errors. A custom layer with integrations removes that.
5. What happens if the vendor raises prices, changes the product or shuts it down? The more your daily operation depends on one package, the more that question matters.

If you answer yes to the first question and no to the others, choose off-the-shelf software and set it up properly. If two or more point the other way, custom software is worth running the numbers on.

Costs over five years: how to work it out

The first invoice tells you little. Off-the-shelf software is cheap to start with and gets more expensive as you grow. Custom software needs an upfront investment and then has a fixed monthly fee. So put the total cost over five years side by side.

A worked example based on assumptions, not a quote: a package at €45 per user per month costs €13,500 over five years with five users. With twenty users it is €54,000, before any price increases. A custom system costing €15,000, with €75 per month for maintenance and €2,500 a year for further development from year two, costs €29,500 over five years, regardless of the number of users.

With five users the package wins comfortably. With twenty, custom wins, and the gap grows with every user you add. Work it out for your own situation with your real numbers, and include the hours spent on workarounds: they are often the biggest item.

Price increases are not hypothetical. On 1 August 2025 Salesforce raised prices on, among others, the Enterprise and Unlimited editions of Sales Cloud and Service Cloud by an average of 6 percent (source). With a subscription, the vendor decides what you pay next year.

The costs that aren't in the quote

Both routes have costs you only see later. Include them in your comparison.

• With off-the-shelf software: modules you turn out to need after all, extra fees for external users, hours spent setting up and maintaining workarounds, and the time a migration takes if you ever want to leave.
• With custom software: the monthly fee for hosting, monitoring and security updates, further development when your process changes, and your own time for the intake, testing and rollout.
• With both: cleaning up and migrating your existing data. Duplicate clients and inconsistent spellings travel into any new system unless you deal with them first.

Ownership, data and exit: settle it up front

The question asked least at the time of purchase is what happens when you want to stop. Ask it anyway, because the answer differs a lot between the two routes.

At Vorteca your data is yours. After full payment you receive the right to use the code, design and content made specifically for your project. Generic Vorteca building blocks remain Vorteca's, with a perpetual right of use within your project. See also what you own when you switch developers.

GDPR: whichever route you choose

If a vendor or developer processes personal data on your behalf, such as client or employee data, Article 28 of the GDPR requires a data processing agreement. That applies to a SaaS package just as much as to custom software.

With either route, ask where the data is stored, who has access, which other parties are involved (sub-processors) and how your data is deleted when the contract ends. With custom software you have more say: you help decide where it runs and who can see what.

Vorteca hosts data within the EU by default, enforces authorisation at row level in the database and puts every project through a security review before launch. If we process personal data on your behalf, we put that in a data processing agreement.

Often the answer is: both

The choice is rarely all or nothing. In practice a hybrid setup works best: keep off-the-shelf software for what works the same everywhere, and build only the part that is specific to your business. Integrations make sure data is never entered twice.

• Accounting, email and file storage stay in the packages you already use.
• Your core process, such as scheduling, quoting, operations or client contact, gets its own system that does exactly what your team needs.
• Where a package has an API or export, we integrate with it. Where it doesn't, we produce an export in the format the other side expects.

Examples from practice

• Hoveniersbedrijf Peter van der Linden: clients, calendar, quotes, invoices and expenses live in one custom CRM instead of Word, Excel and loose admin. Excel hasn't gone, it has become an export: the quarterly VAT overview goes to the tax return per return category.
• Operations portal for an aviation company: flight handling, end-of-day close, rosters and procedures in one place, for 15 daily users across 7 roles. The portal works alongside what was already there: the flight schedule is still imported from Excel, after which everyone works in the same overview.

What does custom software cost at Vorteca?

You pay once for the build and then a fixed monthly fee for hosting, monitoring and technical maintenance, regardless of the number of users.

The exact price follows an intake, once it is clear which process we are building and which integrations are needed. If the intake shows an off-the-shelf package fits better, we will tell you. All packages are on the pricing page.