Service / 01
We do not reskin Dawn or hand you a buy-once theme. Every Shopify build is a custom theme written for your catalogue, your brand, and the way your buyers move from category page to checkout. Lighthouse 95+ on mobile is the floor we ship at, and the technical SEO foundations Google rewards are baked into the build, not retrofitted after launch.
What it unlocks
Built for ecommerce brands that have outgrown a templated theme, need senior eyes on every UX decision, and want the people who built the store to be the same people running paid media, SEO, or CRO post-launch.
Capabilities
Engagement rhythm
Free scoping call and fixed-price quote
Discovery and IA
Design and build
Launch and post-launch CRO
What we do
Custom sections, dynamic blocks, and editor-friendly metafields built so your merchandising team can run the store after launch without calling us every time they want to swap a hero image, reorder a collection, or push a new homepage banner. Template hierarchy designed deliberately around your catalogue, not bolted on top of a marketplace theme.
Lighthouse 95+ on mobile is the floor we ship at, not the ceiling we aim for. Optimised images, lazy-loaded media, Liquid sections written for speed, deferred third-party scripts, Core Web Vitals tuned before launch. Most templated themes are built with desktop in mind and ship at 60-70 on mobile; we treat 95+ as table stakes.
Product pages designed around the questions your buyers ask before they buy: sizing, fit, returns, lead time, social proof. Reviews, FAQs, trust signals, urgency cues placed deliberately, not pattern-matched from another store. Checkout extensions (Shopify Plus) or Shopify standard checkout configured for fastest path to conversion with the trust signals that matter.
Schema markup, sitemaps, hreflang where you sell cross-border, structured product data, Google Merchant Centre feeds wired up clean before launch. The technical SEO foundations Google rewards over the long term, baked into the build rather than retrofitted by an SEO agency six months later.
Klaviyo, Loox, Gorgias, Recharge, Searchanise: we pick the apps that earn their seat in the stack and skip the rest. Server-side tracking via Shopify's Customer Events and the Meta and Google Conversions APIs as default. Each app gets a review at six months; the ones not earning their fee get pulled.
Most build clients keep us on for paid media, SEO, or CRO post-launch. The same team that built the store knows where the optimisation surface is and can move on it. We are happy to hand you the keys and walk away too, full source code, full documentation, full Shopify admin transfer, no plugin lock-in. Your call.
How an engagement runs
30-minute call to understand your catalogue, your team's workflow, your current platform (if any), and what 'success' looks like in 12 months. Within 48 hours we send a fixed-price quote and timeline. No estimate ranges, no surprise scope changes once we start. If the scope grows mid-build, we agree the new line items before any of that work begins.
Catalogue audit (product types, variants, collections, custom data). Workflow audit (who edits what, what apps live in the stack, what integrations matter). IA design: navigation, taxonomy, PDP structure, collection layout. Wireframes signed off before any pixel work starts.
Design in Figma against the agreed IA. Theme build in parallel where possible. Custom sections and metafields for the merchandising controls your team actually needs. Apps integrated and tested. Conversions API wired. Schema deployed. Staging walkthroughs at the 50 percent and 100 percent marks.
Migration weekend if you are coming from another platform: products, customers, orders, redirects. Search Console and GMC re-verified. Post-launch QA across browsers and devices. First 30 days are bug-fix-included; after that, optional CRO retainer kicks in if you want us testing PDP variants and collection layouts continuously.
The lay of the land
There is a class of premium Shopify theme (Dawn, Impulse, Prestige, Be Yours) that does most of what most stores need, and for stores under 100 SKUs with simple workflow it is usually the right answer. Where premium themes struggle is performance at scale (Lighthouse drops fast once you add 5+ apps), bespoke merchandising controls (anything beyond the templated section list requires a developer anyway), and SEO signal architecture (schema, content depth, internal linking patterns) that the off-the-shelf themes treat as afterthoughts.
The trade is: themed builds get you live cheaper and faster, but compound less. Bespoke builds cost more upfront and ship in 8 to 12 weeks instead of 2, but they compound: Lighthouse stays above 90 because every section was written for performance, SEO foundations were baked in so organic growth from month six onwards is real, and your merchandising team can actually run the store without a developer in the loop. For stores above 100 SKUs or above R500k monthly revenue, bespoke is the better economic answer.
Shopify Plus, specifically, opens up checkout extensions, B2B catalogues, multi-storefront, and Functions-based logic that none of the standard themes touch. If your business model needs any of those (subscription, B2B pricing tiers, custom shipping logic, advanced loyalty), the build complexity moves up a tier and Plus is the right home for it. We will tell you in the scoping call whether Plus is genuinely necessary or whether standard Shopify is fine for your stage.
FAQ
Depends on catalogue size, integration complexity, and design ambition. The free scoping call ends with a fixed-price quote within 48 hours, line-itemed by scope and timeline. No estimate ranges, no scope-creep mid-build. Larger catalogues, B2B pricing, Shopify Plus features, or heavy integrations move the timeline and budget; we are specific in the quote about what is included and what is not.
8 to 12 weeks for most bespoke builds, longer for Shopify Plus with subscription, B2B, or multi-storefront complexity. We block out the full timeline in the scoping call so you know what to plan around. Migration weekend (if you are moving platforms) adds a separate day on top, scheduled to your low-traffic window.
Fully custom. We do not reskin Dawn, Impulse, Prestige, or any premium buy-once theme. Bespoke architecture from scratch, written for your catalogue. Section system designed so your merchandising team can run the store after launch without developer help.
Standard Shopify is enough for most stores under R50m annual revenue or without complex B2B, subscription, or multi-storefront needs. Plus is right when you need checkout extensions, B2B catalogues, Shopify Functions, multi-store, or hit Shopify's standard transaction limits. We will tell you in the scoping call, not push Plus by default.
Yes. WooCommerce migrations are most common, then Magento, then BigCommerce. Product, customer, and order data migrated cleanly. 301 redirects from the old URL structure to the new (this is the part most agencies skip, and it is the part that protects your organic traffic). SEO continuity is part of the migration scope.
First 30 days bug-fix is included. After that, optional retainer for ongoing CRO, new section builds, app integrations, and theme updates. Many clients keep us on for paid media, SEO, or CRO retainers, but you are not locked in. You own the source code and the Shopify admin; you can leave any time.
Yes. Bespoke metafields, custom sections, dynamic blocks built specifically so your merchandising team can edit copy, swap images, toggle banners, add collections, and reorder PDP sections without writing Liquid. We train your team during handover. If your team prefers a hands-off approach, the optional retainer covers it.