2026 Update
SaaS prices are rising 15-25% annually while per-seat costs compound. The average 50-person company now pays $180K/year in per-seat SaaS fees—equivalent to hiring two developers.
Key Insight
The Landlord Analogy: Imagine if your office landlord increased your rent every time you hired a new employee. You'd move immediately. Yet this is exactly how 99% of B2B SaaS pricing works.
The "Growth Tax" Explained
Per-user pricing is effectively a tax on your company's success. As you scale, your software costs shouldn't scale linearly. Efficiency should make them cheaper per unit of output—not more expensive.
| Company Size | SaaS Cost (Per-User) | Custom Platform (Flat) | Annual Savings |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 employees | $36K/yr | $15K/yr | $21K |
| 50 employees | $180K/yr | $25K/yr | $155K |
| 100 employees | $360K/yr | $35K/yr | $325K |
| 500 employees | $1.8M/yr | $75K/yr | $1.725M |
The Freedom of Flat Rates
Building your own internal platform decouples costs from headcount. Whether you have 10 users or 10,000, your server costs might increase by $50—but licensing costs stay at $0.
""We were paying $35/seat for a BI tool. With 200 employees, that's $84K/year. Our custom dashboard cost $40K to build and $200/month to run."
"
The payback math is usually under 12 months. After that, it's pure savings—compounding annually while SaaS costs keep rising.
The Hidden Costs of Per-User Pricing
The sticker price is just the beginning. Per-user pricing creates a cascade of hidden costs:
License Management Overhead: Someone has to manage who has access. That's admin time. That's IT tickets. That's delayed onboarding while you wait for approval.
Shadow IT Costs: When seat licenses are expensive, people share accounts. This creates security risks, audit failures, and data attribution problems.
Artificial Scarcity Decisions: Should the intern get access to the CRM? Should the part-time contractor see the analytics? These questions shouldn't exist—every person who needs data should have it.
Growth Forecasting Problems: Your CFO now has to model SaaS costs into every hiring decision. A 50-person hiring plan includes $180K in additional software costs. That changes the math on the entire plan.
The Transition Strategy
You don't have to replace everything at once. The smart approach:
Phase 1: High-Volume Internal Tools Start with tools used by everyone: BI dashboards, reporting, internal wikis. These have the highest per-seat burn and often the lowest switching cost.
Phase 2: Specialized Workflow Tools Move to department-specific tools: sales workflows, support ticketing, inventory management. These require more customization but offer bigger efficiency gains.
Phase 3: Customer-Facing Systems Finally, tackle your core product infrastructure. This is where custom development becomes a competitive advantage, not just a cost optimization.
Complete Data Control
Beyond cost, there's control. When you pay per user, you're often restricted on who gets access to data. Do you really want to pay $35/month just so a freelancer can view one dashboard?
Verification Checklist
- Unlimited Users: Grant access to contractors, clients, and partners at no extra cost.
- Granular Permissions: You define roles, not the vendor's pricing tier.
- Data Portability: Your SQL database is yours. Export, backup, or move anytime.
- No Usage Limits: Remove artificial API call caps and storage restrictions.
- Real-Time Access: Add read-only dashboards for anyone who needs visibility.
- White-Label Options: Expose interfaces to clients without per-seat costs.
- Full API Control: Build exactly the integrations you need.
- Audit Logs: Generate compliance reports on your schedule, not theirs.
Break-Even Analysis
| Factor | SaaS Model | Custom Platform |
|---|---|---|
| Year 1 | Lower (rental) | Higher (build) |
| Year 2 | Rising | Stable |
| Year 3+ | Compounding | Paid off |
| Break-even | N/A | 18-24 months |
| 5-Year TCO | $$$$ | $$ |
Audit Current Spend
Calculate total per-seat costs across all SaaS. Include hidden costs: overages, add-ons, enterprise tier upgrades.
Identify High-Cost Targets
Which tools have the highest per-seat rates AND lowest feature utilization? These are your first build targets.
Model the Break-Even
At your growth rate, when will custom be cheaper? For most companies: 18-24 months.
Build the MVP
Start with a single-function replacement. Prove the economics before expanding scope.
Escape the Growth Tax
Your software should be an infrastructure asset, not a payroll liability. Breaking free from per-user pricing is the first step toward digital sovereignty. Start with a Technical Blueprint to identify escape opportunities.
