In 2025, French e-commerce passed the one-hundred-and-fifty-billion-euro mark in annual revenue. This dizzying growth hides a less glorious reality: a substantial share of the value created by French merchants leaves the country, captured by American marketplaces, North American payment platforms, and software solutions of non-European origin that equip the vast majority of French merchant sites.
The hidden pyramid of dependence
When a French SME sells online, it joins a value chain whose links are rarely French. The eCommerce platform running the site is often Canadian or American. The payment system is generally North American. The tax calculation service may be American. The service sending transactional emails is often American. The abandoned cart recovery system is generally American. The marketplace on which the SME opens a secondary storefront is American. The advertising service that brings visitors is American.
At each step, a commission is taken. When the end customer pays one hundred euros for a French product, the French merchant's net margin shrinks after this cascade of deductions. None of these players is inherently malicious. Each provides a real service. But the sum of these deductions represents several points of margin transferred outside the French economic circuit.
A ratchet effect
The situation is aggravated by a ratchet effect. Once a merchant has built their business on a proprietary platform, they are captive. Migrating an eCommerce site with its catalog, order history, customers, organic search rankings and accumulated extensions is a costly, risky project. The platform can then adjust its prices gradually, knowing that the cost of leaving often exceeds the cost of the increase endured.
This mechanism is not specific to eCommerce. It applies to any software customer-supplier relationship. But it takes on particular intensity in online commerce, where the slightest malfunction leads to an immediate loss of revenue, which makes merchants extremely reluctant to any migration.
An integrated alternative: eCommerce and ERP united
Odoo eCommerce follows a different logic. The merchant site is not a separate tool that you link to the information system. It is a direct emanation of the information system. The products displayed are the products of the ERP catalog. The stock displayed is the real stock of the warehouses. The prices applied come from the active pricelist. Orders entered online immediately become sales orders in the ERP. The invoice issued is the company's official invoice. The payment collected is automatically reconciled with the invoice.
This native integration has two strategic consequences. The first is financial. The cascade of deductions shrinks substantially. No double subscription for platform and ERP. No third-party service to synchronize stock. No third-party tool for transactional emails. The gross margin of the eCommerce operation improves.
- The second consequence is about assets
- The merchant becomes the owner of their tool
- The code is open
- The data is theirs
- Any future migration, should it arise, does not depend on the goodwill of a third-party vendor
- Commercial autonomy is strengthened
Logistics and payment, sensitive building blocks
Two building blocks deserve particular attention. Shipping logistics for French commerce must be able to integrate the main carriers:
- Chronopost, Colissimo, Mondial Relay, DPD, GLS, as well as pickup point solutions.
- Odoo provides the necessary connectors, with label printing, shipment tracking and returns management.
- On this front, the standard is competitive with the specialized solutions on the market.
Payment is more subtle. The most widely used payment platforms in France are Stripe, Adyen, GoCardless, Mollie, and among French players, Lyra and Lemonway. Odoo natively integrates the main ones, and French players can be plugged in via third-party modules. For a French SME that wants to limit its American dependence, choosing a European or French payment player becomes relevant, without sacrificing user experience or security.
European taxation and the OSS one-stop shop
For merchants who sell beyond France to European consumers, taxation is a major point of attention. The intra-community revenue threshold of ten thousand euros per year triggers the obligation to charge the VAT of the customer's destination country. This is heavy to manage without a suitable tool.
Odoo natively handles the OSS one-stop shop, which radically simplifies the quarterly declaration of sales to other European countries. This integration, mundane in appearance, is in practice a decisive argument for French merchants opening up their European markets.
Reclaiming the value chain
Choosing an eCommerce platform is not a technical choice. It is a strategic decision that determines where the company's control ends and where its dependence on players it has no hold over begins. For French SMEs and mid-sized companies that want to rebuild their commercial autonomy in the digital world, eCommerce-ERP integration represents one of the most strategic developments of the decade.
ANOR supports this transformation with an approach of complete audit of the online sales chain, identification of hidden frictions, and implementation of an integrated, sovereign and high-performing platform.