Webshops in Ghent
Ecommerce agency in Ghent for shops that sell in Belgium
Bancontact at checkout, Dutch and French that read as Belgian, and the consumer rules done right.
Belgium looks small until you open a shop here
An ecommerce agency in Ghent sees the same pattern with brands from abroad: a shop that sells well at home stalls in Belgium. Shoppers here pay with Bancontact, read Dutch in Flanders and French in Brussels and Wallonia, and a discount is checked against Belgian rules that are stricter than many expect.
This page is for founders and e-commerce managers outside Belgium, and for expats who run a store in Ghent. It covers which route into the market fits you, what checkout costs per order with real provider fees, the consumer rules you sell under, and the mistakes we see most. Calls run in English, face to face in the city centre or by video.
Three ways into the Belgian market
Most brands that ask us about Belgium already sell online at home. The question is how much of the shop has to change. Pick the route that matches how different Belgium is for you:
- Choose a Belgian view of your existing shop ifyour products, prices and delivery promise are the same as at home. You add Dutch and French product copy written for Belgians, Bancontact at checkout and Belgian VAT in the prices, and keep one catalogue and one back office.
- Choose a separate Belgian storefront ifyour range, prices or delivery times differ, or a Belgian partner runs the stock. A storefront of its own keeps promotions and legal texts apart, so a discount in Belgium never leaks into your home market.
- Choose a shop built in Ghent ifyou run a physical store here and the webshop sells what is on your shelves. Then the till and the shop should share one stock, which is where Shopify or Lightspeed comes in.
- Wait with a shop ifyou expect a handful of orders a month. A product page with a request form costs a fraction and tells you whether demand is there; is an online store worth it works through the numbers.
The figure above checks Shopify, WooCommerce, Lightspeed and custom builds against what a shop in Ghent needs. The longer comparison is in Shopify or WooCommerce, and if you would rather keep your data with a European company, read Shopify alternatives in Europe.
What Belgian checkout costs per order
Bancontact is the Belgian debit card scheme; a shop that sells to Belgian consumers offers it next to cards. The fee per payment differs little between providers, the monthly fee and the extras do:
| Payment | Mollie | Shopify Payments, Basic plan |
|---|---|---|
| Bancontact | 0.39 euros | 0.39 euros |
| European consumer card | 1.80% + 0.25 euros | 2% + 0.25 euros |
| Wero, Belgium | 0.39 euros | not listed |
| Monthly fee | none for online payments | 24 euros a month, paid yearly |
Shipping usually costs more than payment. Inside Belgium a parcel with an online bpost label starts at 7.10 euros in 2026, so decide early whether Belgian customers pay for delivery and from which basket size it is free. The full bill of building and running a shop is in ecommerce website cost, the plans and fees in how much Shopify costs, and what a product earns after all of it in the margin calculator.
The consumer rules you sell under in Belgium
| Rule | What it means for your shop | Since |
|---|---|---|
| Right of withdrawal | consumers may cancel an online purchase within 14 days without giving a reason | long in force |
| Withdrawal button | a clear online button to withdraw, followed by a confirmation | 19 June 2026 |
| Price reductions | a discount is calculated on the lowest price of the previous 30 days, per sales channel | in force |
| Accessibility | a shop usable by keyboard and screen reader, with a statement on how accessible it is | 28 June 2025 |
| VAT across borders | above 10,000 euros a year in sales to consumers in other EU countries, the buyer's VAT through the One-Stop Shop | 1 July 2021 |
Belgium gives micro-enterprises, with fewer than ten employees and turnover or a balance sheet under 2 million euros, five extra years for accessibility; for other shops fines run to 200,000 euros or 6 percent of yearly turnover. More in the EU withdrawal button, the European Accessibility Act and one year of the EU accessibility law. Shipping from outside the EU? Read about the 3 euro customs duty on small parcels.
Where foreign shops go wrong in Belgium
A shop that runs from Ghent itself
If you have a store in Ghent and deliver orders yourself, the city centre has car-free areas. Any motor vehicle with a destination inside needs a permit, even for a five-minute drop:
| Car-free area | When a supplier may drive in | Permit |
|---|---|---|
| Areas 1 to 4 | 18:00 to 11:00 | free, per day or per year for one area |
| Area 5 | 05:00 to 19:00 | free, per day or per year |
| Any area, for a yearly permit | when you deliver there about once a week | proof with delivery notes or waybills |
You apply at least five working days ahead through the e-counter of the city's mobility company. All car-free areas lie inside the low-emission zone, so check your van first. Everything else a business site in Belgium must show, from the enterprise number to opening hours, is on web design in Ghent.
Being found by Belgian shoppers
A Belgian shopper searches in Dutch or French, with Belgian words. Category pages built on those searches, with hreflang between the languages, bring buyers the ads do not reach; read ecommerce SEO. Around launch, Facebook and Instagram ads with your catalogue fill the first weeks, and the ROAS calculator tells you when the spend pays back. If a live shop does not sell, start with why is my online store not selling.
Which platform fits your shop?
| Online fast | Till in the store | Several languages | Own features | No platform fee per sale | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shopifyfrom 24 euros a month | good fit | possible | possible | poor fit | possible |
| WooCommerceon your own WordPress | possible | poor fit | good fit | possible | good fit |
| Lightspeedtill and webshop together | possible | good fit | possible | poor fit | possible |
| Custombuilt around your own process | poor fit | possible | good fit | good fit | good fit |
Shopifyfrom 24 euros a month
- Online fast: good fit
- Till in the store: possible
- Several languages: possible
- Own features: poor fit
- No platform fee per sale: possible
WooCommerceon your own WordPress
- Online fast: possible
- Till in the store: poor fit
- Several languages: good fit
- Own features: possible
- No platform fee per sale: good fit
Lightspeedtill and webshop together
- Online fast: possible
- Till in the store: good fit
- Several languages: possible
- Own features: poor fit
- No platform fee per sale: possible
Custombuilt around your own process
- Online fast: poor fit
- Till in the store: possible
- Several languages: good fit
- Own features: good fit
- No platform fee per sale: good fit
Our own assessment. Shopify charges a percentage per online card payment on top of your payment provider unless it runs through Shopify; with WooCommerce and custom builds you only pay your provider.
Have these answers ready for a first call
- Which countries you ship from, and whether a Belgian warehouse or partner is involved.
- The size of your range for Belgium, and whether prices differ from home.
- Your platform today, and who runs it.
- How many orders a month you expect from Belgium in the first year.
- Your returns policy, and who pays for the parcel back.
- Which languages your customer service can handle.
What brands from abroad ask us first
- Do we need a Belgian company to sell to Belgians?
- Not for selling online from another EU country. You charge the buyer's VAT through the One-Stop Shop once your EU sales to consumers pass 10,000 euros a year; your accountant registers it at home.
- Can you work on our existing Shopify shop?
- Yes. We start with the checkout, the languages and the legal pages for Belgium, then the product and category pages, without rebuilding what works.
- How do you plan the Dutch and French copy?
- Per category, starting with the products that sell most at home. Each language gets its own product texts and search terms; your team checks the product facts before anything goes live.
Webshop development
How VBS builds a shop for Belgium
We work in English with you and write the Dutch and French pages ourselves. We set up Bancontact, Belgian VAT and the legal pages, connect the shop to your stock and shipping, and measure orders only after consent. We have no client webshop to show you, and say so. What we have built are the parts: the cost calculator of SN Group, where a visitor composes a renovation and sees a price, and the consent step of Park & Wash before Meta's pixel measures anything. Everything about our approach is on webshop development. Book a call: your products, your markets, your volumes.
Selling into Belgium next year?
Tell us what you sell, where you ship from and how many orders you expect. We reply within 24 hours.
Rather get in touch right away?