Mailchimp vs Constant Contact: Store Flows or Event Tickets

The short answer: if you fill workshops, open days or ticketed classes and email is how you fill them, Constant Contact sells the tickets in the same account that sends the invitations, through Stripe or PayPal, with a platform fee of 3.5% on events created from 1 August (event payments article, read on 26 October 2026). If you sell from an online store, or want prices you can compare before you talk to anyone, Mailchimp publishes its tiers, with Standard from $20 a month for 500 contacts (Mailchimp pricing, checked on 26 October 2026). On that date Constant Contact's pricing page served automated readers a bot challenge instead of prices, so none are quoted here.

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Mailchimp is the generalist that grew up around online stores: free store connections, flows built on carts and orders, and contact tiers you pick yourself. Constant Contact describes itself as built for small businesses, nonprofits and agencies, and puts event registration, survey pages and social ads next to email (site overview). Look at what you sell before you look at features.

Three things to check against your own calendar:

1. What a ticketed event costs you in fees. For example, 80 tickets at $35 = $2,800 in sales; Constant Contact's 3.5% platform fee on that is $98, before Stripe's or PayPal's own charge. The article says you can add the platform fee, but not the processor's fee, to the registrant's order (event payments article).
2. Who works in the account and how many automations run. Constant Contact's Lite plan has 1 user and 1 active automation path, Standard 3 of each; Mailchimp Essentials has 3 seats and flows of up to 4 steps, Standard 5 seats and up to 200 flows (Constant Contact plan comparison, Mailchimp pricing).
3. How clean the list is before it arrives. Constant Contact's contact tier follows the peak of active contacts in your account, and a later clean-up does not lower it (billing article). Remove inactive contacts in the export, not after the import.
4. The ratio you will report. Registrations per invitation sent, then attendance per registration. Note both for your last three events.

Plan by plan

Constant Contact rows from its plan comparison and billing article; Mailchimp rows from its pricing page and plans article.

Where they differ in use

Selling a seat at an event

Constant Contact's event payments run through Stripe or PayPal, and a free event with a $0 ticket, or no ticket at all, can go live without connecting payments (event payments article). The invitation, the registration and the reminder sit in one account. Mailchimp's plan table lists no event or ticketing feature, so the same programme on Mailchimp needs a ticketing tool and a connection between them.

What the entry plans leave out

Constant Contact's Lite plan cannot schedule emails in advance and has no subject-line A/B testing, per its plan comparison. Mailchimp's Essentials includes both, and caps flows at 4 steps instead (plans article). If one person sends a weekly newsletter at a set time, scheduling alone can decide the entry plan.

How each bills a list that changes

Mailchimp bills the tier you choose and charges for overage if the list grows past it during the month; if you reduce the list and keep it lower for a full billing cycle, the extra charges stop (plans article). Constant Contact bills on the highest active count you have reached, and the monthly fee applies in months when you send nothing (billing article). A seasonal organisation that imports a large list once a year should price that peak.

What it costs

Mailchimp's monthly prices in USD after the trial, checked on 26 October 2026 on its pricing page. For Constant Contact, open the pricing page in a browser; it blocked automated reading on the same day, and its knowledge base points there for current plan and contact-tier prices.

From 10,000 contacts Mailchimp also offers 15% off for 12 months on the same pricing page.

Before you sign either

Do the free work first. List the next six months of events with the seats you need to fill, export your contacts, remove anyone who has not opened an email in a year, and count what is left: that count sets your tier on both. Mailchimp lets you start free with up to 250 contacts and 500 emails a month (plans article); a free Constant Contact event needs no payment set-up, so you can run one through its registration form before paying for tickets.

Constant Contact lets you prepay for 6 or 12 months, and its billing article says prepayments are not refunded even if you cancel before the term ends (billing article). A prepayment discount trades your flexibility for the vendor's cash flow. Take it in the second year, once the first has shown you will stay.

A campaign drafted from a goal, released by a person

Constant Contact's Campaign Builder, on Standard and Premium, asks a few questions about your goal and generates a multi-channel campaign: emails, social posts, SMS messages and events, as drafts with suggested send times (Campaign Builder article). Used for a workshop: you describe the date, audience and seats, and it drafts the invitation, two reminders and a social post. A person checks every date and price in the drafts against the event page, edits the tone, and schedules from the multi-channel tab. Nothing reaches the audience until then.

Choose Mailchimp if

• An online store's carts and orders drive your emails.
• You want to compare published prices before any sales call.
• Three people share the entry plan and need scheduling and A/B tests.

Choose Constant Contact if

• Events, paid or free, are a regular part of how you reach people.
• One login should hold invitations, registrations, surveys and the follow-up.
• Text messages belong in the plan: Premium includes 500 a month.

FAQ

Can Mailchimp sell event tickets?

Its pricing page lists no event or ticketing feature on any plan, so ticket sales would run through a separate tool connected to Mailchimp.

Does removing contacts lower a Constant Contact bill?

No. The billing article says the tier follows the highest number of contacts you have added, and SMS-only contacts do not count toward it.

Which Constant Contact plan includes text messages?

Only Premium has texts built in, 500 a month; Lite and Standard buy them as an add-on, per the plan comparison.