Software Development for Retail and Ecommerce Headless, OMS & Marketplaces
Headless commerce, marketplaces, order management, POS, inventory, and loyalty platforms. Shopify, BigCommerce, commercetools, or fully custom. Shipped in 8 to 20 weeks. USD pricing.
We tell you whether your build fits a SaaS commerce platform with extensions, a headless setup, or a fully custom stack.
Get started in 60 seconds
Who we've built for.
How we work in retail
- What we build
- Headless commerce · Marketplaces · OMS · POS · Inventory · Loyalty · Subscription · B2B portals · PIM
- Stack
- Next.js · Shopify Hydrogen · commercetools · BigCommerce · Algolia · Stripe · Klaviyo · Segment
- Compliance
- PCI DSS · GDPR · CCPA · SOC 2 · WCAG 2.2 AA · PSD2 SCA
- Integrations
- Shopify · BigCommerce · commercetools · NetSuite · SAP · Manhattan · Klaviyo · Algolia · Segment
- Pricing in USD
- Starter build from $12,000 · Headless commerce build from $28,000 · Custom marketplace from $38,000
- Output
- Production storefront · OMS · admin tooling · runbook · on-call coverage
Retail software is where conversion rate, latency, inventory truth, and operational reliability all collide. A 100 ms latency hit on PDPs costs measurable revenue. A 1 percent inventory error rate erodes trust faster than any marketing campaign rebuilds it. This page covers what makes retail builds different, the segments we serve, what conversion-grade architecture looks like, the named clients we have shipped for, and what every category typically costs.
Named retail builds
Recent retail and commerce builds.
Headless commerce front end with conversion optimisation programme.
Read case study →Multi-channel lifestyle brand storefront with PIM and inventory integration.
Read case study →Subscription billing and recurring revenue platform with reconciliation.
Read case study →Retail segments we serve
Headless commerce
Next.js or Remix front end on Shopify Hydrogen, BigCommerce, commercetools, Saleor, or Medusa. Edge-rendered PDPs and PLPs. Algolia or Typesense for search. Personalisation via Segment plus a recommendation engine.
Custom marketplaces
Multi-vendor catalog, seller onboarding with KYC, split payouts via Stripe Connect or Adyen for Platforms, dispute handling, reviews and ratings, search and discovery.
Order management systems (OMS)
Order orchestration across channels (web, marketplace, POS), inventory allocation, ship-from-store logic, returns and exchange flows, integration with WMS (Manhattan, Blue Yonder, NetSuite WMS, Easyship).
Point of sale (POS) and unified commerce
Web-based or tablet POS. Offline-tolerant. Integrated with the same OMS and inventory as the storefront. Apple Pay, Google Pay, EMV chip and tap.
Inventory and PIM
Single source of truth for product catalog. Multi-channel publishing (Shopify, Amazon, eBay, Google Shopping, TikTok Shop). Centralised media management.
Subscription and recurring commerce
Subscription billing via Stripe Billing, Recharge, or custom logic. Pause, skip, swap, churn-recovery flows.
Loyalty and CRM
Tier, points, referrals, lifecycle automation via Klaviyo, Iterable, Braze. Identity resolution across web, app, POS, and email.
B2B and wholesale portals
Account-based pricing, credit limits, PO upload, approval workflows, EDI exchange, NetSuite or SAP integration.
Related services: Custom Ecommerce Tools, Custom Software Development, Web Development, Mobile App Development, AI & Machine Learning, API Integration, Cloud & DevOps, Automation Platforms.
Use cases — concrete examples with cost ranges
Headless storefront on Shopify Hydrogen
Next.js or Hydrogen front end on Shopify Plus backend. PDPs at LCP under 2 seconds. Algolia search. Klaviyo flows. International multi-currency. Typical build 10 to 14 weeks. From $20,000 depending on locale count, catalog size, and personalisation depth.
Custom multi-vendor marketplace
Seller onboarding with KYC and Stripe Connect. Vendor dashboards, payouts, dispute handling. Buyer-side search and discovery. Reviews and ratings. Trust and safety queue. Typical build 14 to 20 weeks. From $32,000 depending on payout complexity and vendor tier count.
Order management system (OMS)
Order ingestion from web, marketplace, POS. Inventory allocation across DCs and stores. Ship-from-store logic. Returns and exchange flows. Integration with WMS or carrier (FedEx, UPS, ShipBob, Easyship). Typical build 12 to 18 weeks. From $22,000 depending on channel count and warehouse integration scope.
Subscription commerce platform
Subscription plans with pause, skip, swap. Failed-payment recovery. Churn analytics. Integration with Stripe Billing or Recharge. Customer portal. Typical build 8 to 12 weeks. From $12,000 depending on billing logic and lifecycle automation depth.
Why retail software is different
Retail builds carry three costs that a standard SaaS does not. First, conversion sensitivity: every 100 ms of added page latency loses measurable revenue. Per Google Web Vitals research, sites with LCP under 2.5 seconds see 24 percent fewer abandonments. The engineering investment in Core Web Vitals is not optional, it is the cost of staying in business. Second, peak-event load: Black Friday or BFCM traffic can be 20x normal. Build assumptions made for normal traffic break expensively at peak. Third, inventory and OMS truth: a customer-facing storefront that lies about inventory drives chargebacks, returns, and review damage that takes months to recover from. We design retail builds around three principles. Cache aggressively at the edge, render at the edge, and keep the synchronous path between user and database as short as physics allows. Treat inventory as the source of truth that flows out to channels, not as an aggregation of channel state. Make peak-event readiness a first-class engineering programme starting in Q3, not a Q4 panic.
Implementation roadmap
Five-phase rhythm for retail builds. Performance gates baked into every sprint.
Discovery and conversion audit (2 weeks)
Current funnel analysis. Web Vitals baseline. Inventory truth audit. Output: prioritised conversion roadmap plus performance baseline.
Architecture and stack selection (1 week)
Headless versus monolith decision. Commerce platform selection. Search and personalisation layer choice. Output: ADR plus integration map.
Build (6 to 14 weeks)
Two-week sprints. Web Vitals gate on every deploy. Conversion analytics wired in week 1. Test coverage gate on checkout and OMS paths.
Pre-launch hardening (2 weeks)
Load test at 10x baseline. Peak-event runbook authored. Inventory reconciliation tested with synthetic load.
Launch and Q4 readiness (1 week plus 2 weeks dual on-call)
Production deploy with feature flags. Monitoring (Datadog, New Relic). On-call rotation. BFCM dry-run if launching pre-Q4.
Tech stack and architecture
Default retail stack. Each layer chosen for low-latency rendering, peak-event reliability, and inventory truth.
- Front end: Next.js with React Server Components. Edge-rendered on Vercel or Cloudflare. ISR for PDPs. Streaming PLPs. WCAG 2.2 AA accessibility baseline.
- Commerce platform: Shopify Hydrogen for fast time-to-market. commercetools or Saleor for headless flexibility. BigCommerce for B2B. Medusa for fully open-source ownership.
- Search and discovery: Algolia or Typesense for instant search. Constructor.io or Klevu for AI-driven merchandising. Vector search via Pinecone for natural-language product discovery.
- OMS layer: Custom OMS for marketplace and unified commerce. Off-the-shelf (Fluent Commerce, Manhattan SCALE, NetSuite OMS) where surface area justifies.
- Payments: Stripe Checkout or Adyen for primary card processing. PayPal, Apple Pay, Google Pay, Klarna, Afterpay, Affirm. PSD2 SCA via Stripe or Adyen.
- Marketing and CRM: Klaviyo or Iterable for lifecycle. Segment as customer data platform. Algolia plus Segment plus recommendation engine for personalisation.
- Cloud: Vercel or Cloudflare for front end. AWS for OMS and backend services. CDN for media. Image optimisation via Cloudinary, Imgix, or Vercel Image.
Compliance and audit readiness
Every retail build ships with the controls and documentation auditors and acquirers expect. PCI DSS through tokenised gateway integration (Stripe Elements, Adyen Drop-in) so card data never touches your servers. GDPR for EU and UK shoppers, with cookie consent, subprocessor list, and right-to-erasure flows. CCPA and CPRA for California residents. PSD2 SCA for EU card payments. SOC 2 Type II for SaaS controls. WCAG 2.2 AA accessibility baseline because ADA litigation in retail has accelerated since 2024.
Cost drivers we see in retail builds
Retail build cost varies 3x to 5x for the same surface area. These are the seven drivers we see push or pull on the number.
- Locale and currency count. Single-locale single-currency is fast. Multi-locale with content translation, tax calculation, payment method localisation, and currency display adds 25 to 40 percent.
- Catalog size and merchandising complexity. 10,000 SKUs is straightforward. 1 million SKUs with variant logic, attribute filtering, and dynamic merchandising is a search and PIM project on its own.
- Integration count (ERP, WMS, OMS, MAP). Shopify only is straightforward. Shopify plus NetSuite plus Manhattan plus Klaviyo plus Segment is five integration projects, each with its own quirks.
- B2B versus DTC versus marketplace. DTC is the cheapest. B2B with account pricing and credit lines adds 30 to 50 percent. Marketplace with KYC, payouts, and trust workflows adds 50 to 80 percent.
- Personalisation depth. Static merchandising is cheap. Real-time per-user personalisation with feature store, recommendation engine, and experimentation framework is its own platform.
- Peak-event capacity. Designing for 2x peak is normal. Designing for 20x peak (BFCM, JNY) requires edge caching, queue-based protections, and dedicated load testing.
- Returns, exchanges, and reverse logistics. Standard returns are cheap. Complex exchange logic with restocking fees, condition grading, and refurb integration adds significant operational complexity.
Pricing
Storefront MVP
From $12,000
- Single locale, single currency, off-the-shelf commerce backend.
- 8 to 12 weeks.
Headless commerce build
From $28,000
- Multi-locale, Algolia search, Klaviyo flows, OMS integration.
- 12 to 18 weeks.
Custom marketplace
From $38,000
- Multi-vendor, KYC, payouts, disputes, search and discovery.
- 14 to 22 weeks.
OMS or unified commerce
From $22,000
- Multi-channel order orchestration with WMS integration.
- 12 to 18 weeks.
Conversion optimisation programme
From $4,500 / month
- A/B test programme, funnel analysis, Web Vitals monitoring, monthly experiment plan.
Maintenance retainer
From $3,250 / month
- On-call cover, dependency upgrades, peak-event prep, conversion monitoring. SLA-backed.
Retail trends shaping 2026 builds
Six retail-software shifts shaping 2026 builds.
- AI search and discovery moving to default. Natural-language product search via Algolia AI, Constructor.io, Klevu. Vector search for visual or conversational discovery. We build with embedding refresh pipelines as a default.
- Composable commerce maturing. MACH (microservices, API-first, cloud, headless) approach mature enough for mid-market, not just enterprise. commercetools and Saleor traction continues to climb.
- Social commerce embedding deeper. TikTok Shop, Instagram Checkout, Pinterest Shopping API. New builds default to native multi-channel sync rather than feed-based.
- Sustainability and circularity. Resale, repair, refurbishment, and trade-in flows as default add-ons. Trove, Recurate, and ReBOUND seeing wider integration.
- BFCM and peak-event readiness shifting earlier. Q3 load-test and runbook authoring increasingly baked into the SDLC, not a Q4 panic.
- Generative AI for content and merchandising. Product description generation, attribute extraction from images, generative product photography. Used in catalog operations, not as a single-shot replacement for editorial review.
FAQ
It depends on your scale and customisation needs. Sub-$10M GMV and standard merchandising: stay monolith. Above $10M GMV with custom storefront needs, multi-locale, or unified commerce ambitions: headless makes sense. We run a 2-week assessment to give you a defensible answer rather than a default.
Yes. Hydrogen front end, custom checkout extensions (via Checkout UI extensions), Shopify Functions, app development. We also extend Shopify Plus with custom services where Shopify will not bend (complex B2B, advanced subscriptions, multi-warehouse OMS).
Yes. BigCommerce for mid-market with strong B2B needs. commercetools for enterprise composable. Saleor for fully open-source ownership. Medusa for early-stage flexibility.
Yes. Magento 2 to Shopify Plus or commercetools is one of our most common migration paths. WooCommerce to Shopify also common. We handle catalog migration, customer migration, order history, SEO redirect map, and gradual cut-over.
Web Vitals gate on every deploy. LCP under 2.5 seconds, INP under 200 ms, CLS under 0.1 measured weekly via Vercel Analytics or SpeedCurve. PR cannot merge if Web Vitals regress more than 5 percent.
Yes. Multi-vendor, KYC with Onfido or Stripe Identity, payouts via Stripe Connect or Adyen for Platforms, dispute handling, trust and safety queue, reviews and ratings. Typical build 14 to 22 weeks.
Yes. Web-based or tablet POS. Offline-tolerant. Integrated with the same OMS and inventory as the storefront. Apple Pay, Google Pay, EMV chip and tap. PCI scope kept minimal via tokenised gateway integration.
Avalara, TaxJar, Vertex, or Stripe Tax depending on volume and complexity. EU VAT, UK VAT, GST, sales tax across 50 US states with nexus tracking. Tax calculated at checkout via API or feed-based depending on commerce platform.
Yes. Stripe Billing, Recharge, Smartrr, or custom subscription logic. Pause, skip, swap, churn-recovery flows. Failed-payment retry strategies. Subscription analytics dashboard.
Yes. Monthly retainer for A/B test programme, funnel analysis, Web Vitals monitoring, monthly experiment plan with hypothesised lift and post-test analysis. Tooling via VWO, Convert, or Optimizely depending on scale.