Shopify development agency for UK and Irish brands

We build new Shopify stores, rebuild existing ones and move stores to Shopify from other platforms. A specialist plans and builds yours, you review it as it takes shape, and you are shown how to run it before launch. The right route depends on where you are now, not on what is easiest for us to sell.

Which route are you on?

• You do not have a store yet, or you are launching a new brand. Build new.
• You are on Shopify, and it has become slow, untidy or hard to change. Rebuild.
• You are on WooCommerce, Magento or IRP Commerce, and maintenance is taking over. Migrate. See moving to Shopify below.
• You are on Shopify and the store mostly works. You may not need a rebuild at all. A fix list, or help with marketing, may do more for you.

The routes compared

	New build	Rebuild	Migration
Best for	A new business or brand	A Shopify store that has outgrown its set-up	A store on another platform
What changes	Everything is set up from scratch	Theme, structure and apps are reworked	Platform, theme and checkout change. Your data moves across
Data to move	Little or none	Little, mostly clean-up	Products, customers, orders and content
Web address and search risk	Low, as there is nothing to lose	Low to medium, if addresses or structure change	Highest, so every old address is mapped to a new one
Typical timeline	Depends on size and complexity	Depends on size and complexity	Depends on size and complexity
Main cost drivers	Design choices and tools to connect	How much is reworked	Catalogue size, data quality and how much is rebuilt

The rest of this page covers how we build, which applies to every route. A rebuild starts with a review of what is already there, so we keep what works and replace what does not.

Theme or custom?

A good theme, set up carefully, is often the right answer. It is quicker to launch, costs less and is maintained by its developer.

Custom design earns its place when:

• your products need a layout no theme offers, such as complex configuration;
• your brand depends on something a theme cannot reproduce; or
• you have outgrown a theme and keep fighting it.

We start with the simplest option that fits and only build custom where it is worth the cost. Seeing a demo store first helps, because it shows what a well-set-up theme can do before you decide you need more.

Apps or custom code?

Apps are quick to add and usually carry a monthly fee. Each one can also add code that slows the store down, and the fees add up. Custom code costs more up front, can be faster and tidier, and has no ongoing fee, but someone has to maintain it.

Our rule is to use Shopify’s built-in features first, then a well-regarded app, then custom code where an app would be heavy or awkward. We list every app in the quote with its monthly cost, so there are no surprises. Paid apps are not included in our price.

Selling in pounds and euros

If you sell in the UK and Ireland, you may want prices in both GBP and EUR. Shopify can show different currencies to customers in different markets, and can set up pricing and payment options for each.

Shopify converts prices at the current exchange rate and can round them to tidy endings, which needs Shopify Payments. You can also set your own price for individual products in a market, so a jacket costs exactly €120 rather than whatever the conversion gives. Each market can have its own web address. A subfolder of your main domain is what Shopify recommends for most stores, because it keeps your search strength in one place, and Shopify adds the tags that tell search engines which version is for which country.

In the planning stage we agree which markets you sell in, what pricing you want in each and how shipping works. Then we test a real order in each currency before launch.

Performance

A slow store loses customers and is harder to find in search. Most slowness comes from the same few causes: too many apps, heavy images, and themes loaded with features you do not use. We keep the app list short, size images properly and remove what the store does not need. After the build we test pages on a phone-sized screen and tell you what we find.

We check Core Web Vitals with PageSpeed Insights and Lighthouse. We do not promise a score.

Checkout

Shopify’s checkout is one of its strengths: it is tested at scale and familiar to customers. How far it can be customised depends on your Shopify plan. We set up payment methods, shipping rates, tax settings and order emails, then place test orders before launch.

On every plan you can brand the checkout and add apps to the thank-you and order status pages. Apps inside the checkout steps themselves, and the deeper customisations, need Shopify Plus. Which payment options appear, such as Shop Pay, Apple Pay, Google Pay or local methods, depends on your country and payment provider, and we confirm the list for your store during set-up.

Search foundations

A store that is easy to read is easier to find. We set up the basics at build time, because they are far cheaper to do now than to fix later: clear page titles and headings, sensible collection and product web addresses, tidy navigation, image descriptions, a sitemap and handling for the duplicate product addresses Shopify can produce.

Shopify gives products, collections and pages fixed address patterns (/products/, /collections/, /pages/), and a product can also be reached through each collection it sits in. A well-built theme points all of those to one main address with a canonical tag, and we check yours does. Shopify creates the sitemap automatically and updates it as you add products.

This is the foundation, not ongoing SEO. Our SEO for ecommerce service builds on it after launch. We make no promises about rankings.

Moving to Shopify from another platform

Moving platforms is the route where most can go wrong, mainly for data and search visibility. Our Shopify migration services overview explains how we protect both, and each platform has its own page.

• WooCommerce to Shopify migration: for stores where plugins, updates and hosting take more time than selling.
• Magento to Shopify migration: for larger catalogues and stores with business-to-business features or many extensions.
• IRP Commerce to Shopify migration: for stores leaving IRP Commerce, starting with who owns your data. We are not affiliated with IRP Commerce.

What it costs

We do not publish a single price here, because there is not one. A store with a few hundred tidy products on a well-chosen theme is a different job from a catalogue of tens of thousands with custom features.

• New Shopify stores start from £5,000 and migrations from £7,500. See the pricing page.
• Every project gets a fixed quote in writing, which lists what is included and what is not.
• Shopify’s own plan fees, paid apps, photography, written product descriptions and advertising are separate, and we name them before you commit.

When Shopify is not the answer

Shopify suits most growing stores, but not all. If you need a payment processor Shopify does not support, another platform may suit you better. If you have reached roughly £1 to 3 million in yearly revenue, or need complex expansion across several countries, we would talk to you about Shopify Plus. And if your store works well and the real problem is traffic or content, a rebuild will not fix it. We would rather say so before you spend anything.

Start with a demo

You do not have to decide the route alone. Look at a demo store, then talk through your situation with us on a short call. We will tell you which route we would take and why.