To me it seems like small businesses like this get squeezed by these demands to make everything cheaper while the big corporations ignore it and stick to their pricing.
I’m not sure OP should have capitulated. Someone who loves this tool will probably gladly pay more.
The question is what is the proportion of people loving it vs liking it.
I'm pretty sure people who give in to subscriptions are usually forced to use a tool (or adobe) for one reason or another. New tool, that does one small thing, would not force many people to go into that absurd payment model.