Drupal Marketplace Pilot Will Launch Without Listing Fees, Focuses on Accessibility and On-Site Sales Options

Tiffany Farriss has announced that the upcoming Drupal Marketplace pilot will not include listing fees, following community feedback gathered during the Marketplace Share Out #8. The decision aims to keep the pilot accessible, particularly for small and individual contributors, while allowing the Drupal Association (DA) to collect real data on review and operational costs before considering future fees.

Key updates based on the feedback include:

• No Listing Fees During the Pilot: There will be no cost to list templates for Drupal Certified Partners (DCPs) during the pilot phase.

• Accessibility Improvements: The DA is exploring options to make the DCP program more inclusive, such as allowing participation from solo contributors or teams of up to three people, and accepting in-kind contributions.

• Standalone Telemetry Module: To improve visibility into template usage, a lightweight telemetry module may be developed as an alternative to relying on the Site Update module.

• Strong Demand for On-Site Purchasing: While the Minimum Viable Product (MVP) will still use off-site sales for financial reasons, the DA is evaluating options for integrating purchasing directly on Drupal.org.

The pilot will initially include only DCPs to maintain structure and manage scope. Sales will remain off-site for now, allowing contributors to manage pricing and licensing directly. A proposed $395 listing fee is intended to cover QA costs and is not being recommended for the pilot.

Questions around template maintenance, referrals, and deployment were also addressed. Maintenance will be enforced through participation agreements, with inactive listings removed. A 10% referral fee applies to upsells tied to Marketplace listings, with a capped window of no more than 12 months. One-click hosting is not part of the MVP but remains a longer-term goal.

The Drupal Association Board will review the pilot and MVP investment on July 24. If approved, the DA will proceed with outreach to DCPs to finalise the initial template lineup and explore technical implementation options.

Community members are encouraged to join the ongoing discussion in the #drupal-cms-marketplace channel.