Backers Club and Substack

Substack is a place to publish. It hosts your newsletter and podcast, sends the emails, and lets you put some of it behind a paywall. For many writers, that is exactly the right deal.

Backers Club backs your newsletter where you already publish it, in public, because your readers want it to keep coming.

The short version

• Choose Substack when you want publishing, email delivery, and paid subscriptions in one place, and a paywall is part of the plan.
• Choose Backers Club when you already publish somewhere you like and want support without locking anything away.

Side by side

• Hosting: Substack hosts your writing and your list. Backers Club sits next to whatever you already use, from Mailchimp to Ghost to a plain RSS feed.
• Paywall: a paid Substack usually means some posts are for paying subscribers only. Backers Club centers on support for public work. Backers pay for it to exist, not to get in. Private benefits are optional.
• Billing: Substack bills monthly or yearly. Backers Club can charge per issue, so a quiet month costs your backers nothing. Monthly works too.
• Fees: Substack takes a share of paid subscriptions plus payment fees. Backers Club takes 8% plus transaction fees, and nothing until a backer pays.
• Home: Backers Club is a small European business, built and hosted in the EU.

Check current features and pricing before deciding. Backers Club’s are on the pricing page.