Peak Adven­ture

The Chal­lenge

While Shimoda’s prod­ucts set the stan­dard for adven­ture pho­tog­ra­phy, their frag­ment­ed dig­i­tal pres­ence was fail­ing to reflect their pre­mi­um brand and com­mu­ni­ty-dri­ven ethos.

When they approached us in 2020, their online store­front was divid­ed across mul­ti­ple web­sites built on Square­space, which, while func­tion­al at a basic lev­el, were hold­ing back their ambi­tious growth plans, and with a visu­al design that didn’t match the brand’s rep­u­ta­tion and com­mu­ni­ty-dri­ven success.

Shi­mo­da need­ed a sin­gle, robust plat­form capa­ble of scal­ing with their busi­ness and deliv­er­ing an online expe­ri­ence as beau­ti­ful and func­tion­al as their prod­ucts. And that’s exact­ly what they got.

The Approach

Based on the pro­duc­t’s unique char­ac­ter­is­tics and the com­mu­ni­ty’s high engage­ment, the site had to be beau­ti­ful, func­tion­al, and easy to use. Like the back­packs.
 

We set out to cre­ate a robust, flex­i­ble, and scal­able ecom­merce ecosys­tem that would:

• Uni­fy Shimoda’s U.S. and EU pres­ence on a sin­gle Big­Com­merce backbone.
• Empow­er their mar­ket­ing team with a no-code expe­ri­ence, reduc­ing time-to-mar­ket from weeks to hours.
• Enhance prod­uct sto­ry­telling with immer­sive gal­leries, video inte­gra­tion, and lifestyle land­ing pages.
• Solve com­plex prod­uct vari­ant chal­lenges with cus­tom PIM inte­gra­tions and URL logic.
• Scale glob­al­ly with mul­ti­coun­try, mul­ti­lan­guage, and mul­ti­c­ur­ren­cy capabilities.

The Solution(s)

We part­nered with Shi­mo­da Designs to exe­cute a full dig­i­tal trans­for­ma­tion, migrat­ing them to a Big­Com­merce plat­form to give their team unpar­al­leled flex­i­bil­i­ty. Our approach was a deep, cus­tom inte­gra­tion that went far beyond a sim­ple migration.

• Cus­tom Prod­uct Vari­ants: We engi­neered a solu­tion to address a core lim­i­ta­tion of Big­Com­merce’s stan­dard vari­ant sys­tem. While Big­Com­merce allows for vari­ants, it keeps the URL and prod­uct descrip­tion sta­t­ic. To sup­port Shimoda’s paid ad cam­paigns and a more dynam­ic user expe­ri­ence, we cus­tomized their Sal­si­fy PIM to send spe­cif­ic data to Big­Com­merce. Our code then inter­pret­ed this infor­ma­tion to cre­ate a vari­ant inter­face that dynam­i­cal­ly changes the URL, prod­uct image, and descrip­tion based on user selection.
• Enhanced Media Gallery: For a brand focused on pho­tog­ra­phers, high-qual­i­ty visu­als were essen­tial. We cus­tom-devel­oped a prod­uct gallery that inte­grates video con­tent direct­ly after the first image. This not only show­cas­es the back­packs in their full glo­ry but also gives their dis­trib­u­tors valu­able mar­ket­ing assets to sup­port their own efforts.
• No-Code Expe­ri­ence: The new site was designed to give Shi­moda’s mar­ket­ing team inde­pen­dence. Through inte­gra­tions with tools like Fas­tr, we enabled a no-code expe­ri­ence for cre­at­ing rich, lifestyle-focused pages. This allows them to build beau­ti­ful con­tent quick­ly and on a mod­est bud­get, keep­ing their online pres­ence fresh and com­pet­i­tive with much larg­er brands.
• Work­ing Inte­gra­tion: We also inte­grat­ed key plat­forms, includ­ing Search­a­nise for a pow­er­ful on-site search, and Omnisend for email mar­ket­ing, ensur­ing all dig­i­tal touch­points worked togeth­er flaw­less­ly.
   

The Result

Shi­mo­da now oper­ates a stun­ning, cohe­sive ecom­merce plat­form that mir­rors the brand’s pre­mi­um crafts­man­ship and founder-led authen­tic­i­ty. Key out­comes include:

• A con­sol­i­dat­ed, uni­fied dig­i­tal plat­form, com­plete with mul­ti-coun­try, mul­ti-lan­guage, and mul­ti-cur­ren­cy sup­port that aligns with Shimoda’s glob­al ambition.
• Real-time mar­ket­ing agili­ty, allow­ing their team to cre­ate and launch cam­paigns with auton­o­my and speed, empow­ered by no-code tools and a flex­i­ble, cus­tom vari­ant system.
• A supe­ri­or user expe­ri­ence, with a cus­tomized gallery and intu­itive vari­ant selec­tion that enhances prod­uct dis­cov­ery and dri­ves conversions.
• Engag­ing, visu­al­ly rich lifestyle sto­ry­telling dri­ving com­mu­ni­ty loy­al­ty and sales growth.