Payments & Payouts
Fees and commission
Fees and commission
Short version: Sonic Bloom takes 0% commission. Not on tips, not on music sales, not on merch, not on your fan club. The only per-sale cost is what Stripe charges to process the card — and that goes to Stripe, not to us.
What you pay Sonic Bloom
$20/month (or $200/year). That's it. One flat subscription, no feature gates, no per-sale cut. Whether you make $5 or $5,000 this month, our slice is the same: zero percent of it.
What Stripe charges
Stripe's standard processing fee is 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction. That's the same fee every Stripe-powered business pays. A quick feel for it:
| Fan pays | Stripe fee | You keep | |---------|-----------|---------| | $5 tip | ~45¢ | ~$4.55 | | $10 download | ~59¢ | ~$9.41 | | $20 tip | ~88¢ | ~$19.12 | | $50 merch | ~$1.75 | ~$48.25 |
No monthly fee from Stripe, no minimum, no setup charge. You only pay the processing fee when you actually make a sale.
Tips, sales, merch, fan club — all 0% from us
- Tip jar — 0% commission. This is a core promise: we literally can't take a cut, because the money never passes through us.
- Digital music sales — 0% commission.
- Merch (both self-shipped and print-on-demand) — 0% commission. On print-on-demand, your only other cost is what your fulfillment partner (Printful) charges to print and ship the item — see Print-on-demand merch.
- Fan club — 0% commission on memberships.
In every case, the only deduction is Stripe's processing fee.
Why this is different
Most platforms take a percentage on top of Stripe: 15% here, 10% plus processing there, a separate $30 tool for your email, another for your store. It adds up fast. Sonic Bloom is one flat $20 — a website, a store, and a fan list — and your sales are yours minus only the card fee.
If that ever changes
We'd tell you plainly. And if we ever charged on sales, it would be a small flat percentage stated up front — never a hidden per-fan tax. The tip jar stays 0% commission, full stop. That's the whole point.