Weโve supported hundreds of acquisitions, and many Stripe Transfer customers come to us in the middle of one โ needing help migrating their Stripe account from one owner to another. Oftentimes, the way they’ve set up their Stripe accounts has a direct impact on whether or not their company’s sale will go through.
Whether you sell digital subscriptions, physical products, or SaaS services, your Stripe account isnโt just a backend tool โ itโs a reflection of your business model. And when that system is cluttered with dozens of outdated product tiers, redundant coupon codes, or inconsistent pricing structures, it can send a red flag to potential buyers. Complexity slows down due diligence, raises integration costs, and makes your business look harder to operate than it really is.
We’ve worked with teams and companies with incredibly complex Stripe setups such as using multiple Subscription Schedules (which are usually not needed at all), thousands (yes, thousands) of Prices for hundreds of duplicated Products, and tons of metadata stored within Stripe on objects that aren’t good for storing data.
A complex Stripe setup isn’t impossible to migrate; we do it every day. And they aren’t impossible to sell, that happens every day too, but we’ve seen dozens of company acquisitions fall through because the Stripe account’s complexities were just the tip of the iceberg indicator for how the entire business has been managed.
Here are a few tips to help reduce Stripe setup complexity:
- Archive or remove outdated plans, coupons, and legacy prices.
- Use simple, standardized plans and avoid one-off exceptions.
- Ask yourself: Can a buyer explain your pricing to their boss?
- Merge duplicate products and prices.
- If acquisition is even a remote possibility, simplify now.
Some complexity within your Stripe account may be due to the software platforms you’ve chosen to use. For instance, a point of sale system may create products and prices for every single customer checkout or subscription. You may want to consider a different point of sale system if this is the case.
We can merge prices, reduce duplicate products, and handle many of these cleanup steps just before a migration. However, it is often that the buyer doesn’t have the patience for that to happen. So why not do it now? Contact us to see how you might make your business more acquisition-ready!
See also, our tips for quick migrations.
