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Part of E-commerce and Marketplaces

E-commerceplatforms.

An online store is two things: a commerce engine that handles money, tax and inventory, and a storefront that does the selling. It is one of two services under E-commerce and Marketplaces.

A storefront built around your product and your customer's hesitation, on an engine chosen for reasons you can read.

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HUREAL / Material studies

In your words

Soundslike this?

  1. Most of our traffic is on a phone and most of our sales are not.

  2. Our trade customers phone their orders in, because the site only knows one price.

  3. We have twenty apps installed and the store is slower than it was.

  4. The stock figure on the site and the stock figure in the warehouse disagree.

  5. Returns are handled in a spreadsheet and a shared inbox.

  6. We know our revenue and we do not know our profit after shipping and returns.

  7. Somebody told us we need to replatform, and nobody has shown us the arithmetic.

If the model is recurring, or two sides have to be brought together, the page for that is Marketplaces, subscriptions and memberships.

In plain language

The engine handles the money.The storefront does the selling.

Most stores are strong on the first and generic on the second. We build the storefront around your product's story and your customer's hesitation, on whichever engine fits the business, which is often a custom storefront on top of a platform.

The engine is a decision you make once. The storefront is the one you defend weekly.

That arrangement gives you the performance and the control of a custom build without rebuilding checkout, tax or payment handling, which are the three parts of commerce where rebuilding buys very little and risks a great deal.

The mobile experience is the product, not a version of it. Most traffic and most hesitation happen on a phone, so the phone experience is designed first and measured hardest, on a mid range device on a cellular connection rather than on a laptop in an office.

When this is not the answer. If the store converts and the problem is that nobody arrives, a rebuild spends the budget on the half that works. Start with Search and AI Visibility or with a performance audit. And where a platform theme already does what you need, we will say so and configure it rather than quoting a build for it.

The capability table

What a storebuild includes.

Fourteen capabilities, what each one does in plain words, and what it changes for the business. The commercial decisions are listed first because they are the ones that decide the rest.

E-commerce platforms, the capability table
Capability What it does What it changes
The commercial decisionsBefore any design
Commerce strategy Catalogue structure, pricing rules, bundles, promotions and the path a buyer actually takes. The store is built around how people actually buy from you.
Platform recommendation The engine decision written down with its reasoning, including the case for staying where you are. You can read why, and disagree with it, before you spend.
The margin and cost model What a sale is worth after shipping, payment fees and returns. Reporting later can answer profit rather than revenue.
The storefrontWhere conversion is decided
Storefront design and build Mobile first, with a performance budget tested on a mid range phone. The experience is fastest where most of the hesitation happens.
Catalogue and merchandising Categories, filters, search, recommendations and product content. People find the thing they meant.
Checkout designed for completion Canadian payment methods, saved details, and as few steps as the order allows. Fewer carts are abandoned at the last screen.
Proof where hesitation happens Reviews, specifications and answers on the product page rather than on a separate one. The question gets answered before it becomes a support ticket.
Product content per language Authored rather than translated, where you sell in more than one. The second market reads something a person wrote.
The money and the back officeWhat has to be true
Payments and taxes GST, HST, PST and QST, with the rules by province. Tax is a configuration rather than an accounting surprise.
Shipping and returns Rates, rules, and what happens to the item when it comes back. Returns stop living in a spreadsheet.
Inventory and pricing connection Read from the ERP or inventory system where one exists. The site and the warehouse stop disagreeing.
Account pricing, quotes and reorder For trade customers buying on terms you already agreed. The trade order stops arriving by phone.
Analytics and attribution Reporting on profit after shipping and returns, not only on revenue. You know which products and campaigns actually make money.
Migration Products, customers, orders and URLs, with redirects. The rankings and the history survive the move.

Scroll the table sideways to read it.

How it works

One catalogue,two prices.

The parent's drawing. One catalogue holds cost, stock, the list price and your account terms. One storefront serves anyone at the list price and a signed in trade account at the price you agreed with them. A credit is still a person's call.

Scroll the drawing sideways to read it.

One catalogue, one storefront, two prices. The branch is the price, not a second store.

What the system does

The work, the path it takes, and everything HUREAL builds. It never means anything else.

What stays with a person

The line, its single opening, and the plate standing in it. On a light board it is the one dark plate.

What you already run

Present, named, and not for sale. The lowest contrast on the board, deliberately.

  1. One place knows the price.

    Cost, stock, the list price and your account terms live together. Everything downstream reads from there, which is the only way a promotion, a trade price and a warehouse count stay consistent with each other.

  2. One storefront, not two.

    Anyone sees the list price. A signed in trade account sees the price you agreed, their own order history, and reordering. A separate store for trade is two catalogues to maintain and two places to be wrong.

  3. One checkout.

    Tax by province and your payment rails, whichever price brought the customer there. Checkout is the part of commerce most worth reusing rather than rebuilding, and keeping one of them is what makes that possible.

  4. Fulfilment and returns are both the plan.

    Picked, shipped and tracked on one side, back on the shelf or not on the other. A return with no design is a return that becomes an email thread.

  5. The credit stops at the line.

    Refunds, terms and exceptions wait for a person, because they are commercial decisions rather than transactions. What sold and what did not goes back to the catalogue, and that is what decides next month's merchandising.

Most projects keep the engine and rebuild the storefront. Where a move really is warranted, you see the arithmetic before you decide, and the recommendation is written down either way.

How we price

The deliverables

What youend up with.

  • A store you own

    On an engine chosen for reasons you can read, running in your own accounts.

  • A mobile experience designed as the primary one

    With a performance budget tested on a mid range phone on a cellular connection.

  • The platform recommendation, in writing

    Including the case for staying where you are.

  • Product content in each language your customers use

    Authored rather than translated.

  • Account pricing and reorder for trade customers

    Their agreed price, their history, their repeat order.

  • Tax, shipping and returns configured per province and per rule

    Rather than approximated and corrected later.

  • Reporting on profit after shipping and returns

    So which products make money is a number rather than a belief.

  • A merchandising system your team runs

    Without a developer.

  • The migration record

    Products, customers, orders, and every redirected URL.

What is not on this list. A recurring revenue model. Plans, trials, proration, dunning, entitlements and payouts are a different build with a different centre of gravity, and they are on Marketplaces, subscriptions and memberships. Conversion work after launch is Care and Optimization.

By category

What a storeconnects to.

By category, because the category is the question. On a store the connections are not a nice extra: a catalogue that disagrees with a warehouse is a refund and an apology.

  • Commerce engines

    Where money, tax and inventory are handled.

    Shopify, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, Adobe Commerce

  • ERP and inventory

    Where stock, cost and account terms are true.

    NetSuite, SAP, Sage, an in house system

  • Accounting

    Where an order becomes a number your accountant recognises.

    QuickBooks, Sage, Xero

  • Payments

    Where the money actually moves, with the methods Canadian buyers expect.

    card, Interac, digital wallets, your acquirer

  • Shipping and fulfilment

    Where rates, labels and tracking come from.

    Canada Post, Purolator, UPS, a third party warehouse

  • Marketing and email

    Where an abandoned cart and a reorder reminder live.

    Klaviyo, Mailchimp, Google Ads, Meta

  • Reviews and product data

    Where proof and specifications come from.

    a reviews platform, a product information system, your own database

  • Analytics and attribution

    Where the profit question is answered.

    Google Analytics, server side tagging, your own reporting

Every connection is validated by HUREAL's engineers during scoping and confirmed in writing before signature. Where a system genuinely cannot be connected, you hear it during discovery rather than during the build, and the scope is drawn around it instead of making a platform migration the price of entry.

Asked and answered

Questions peopleactually ask.

  • Do we have to leave our current platform?

    Usually not. The engine handles money and inventory well, and the storefront is what decides conversion. In most projects we rebuild the storefront and keep the engine. If a move really is warranted, we show you the arithmetic before you decide.

  • What about all the apps we have installed?

    They get inventoried. Some are doing real work and stay. Some are doing work the storefront should do natively, so they get built in and removed, which usually improves speed. You get the list with a recommendation per app, and you decide.

  • Can you build the store in more than one language?

    Yes, authored rather than translated, including product content, checkout, receipts and search terms. How that works is on the Multilingual websites page, and the decision belongs in scoping rather than after launch.

  • Can trade customers see their own prices?

    Yes, and it is the design at the centre of the drawing above. One catalogue and one storefront serve both, with the signed in account seeing the price you agreed, their history and reordering. Two separate stores is two places to be wrong.

  • Who owns the store?

    You do. The code, the content, the customer data and the accounts are yours, with admin access from day one. We build on mainstream, well documented technology so somebody who has never met us can maintain it.

  • What happens to our search rankings when we replatform?

    Every product, category and content URL is mapped before the old store comes down, and the map is a document you keep. Pages that already earn traffic are identified first, and the new structure is drawn around them.

  • What does it cost?

    The build price is set after the discovery call and sent in a written proposal, because an honest number needs the scope, and on a store the scope is mostly the catalogue and the integrations. The number is written into the signed scope and does not move once it is signed.

Three pages next to this one

Where thissits.

Close

Two ways to start.Both end with a document you own.

Book a discovery call

For when you know what has to change and want the scope before the spend. A discovery call with the people who own the outcome. We go through margin, repeat rate, average order, returns and the systems involved, and afterwards you get a written proposal with a scope, a price and a timeline you can sign or walk away from.

Book a discovery call

Request a performance audit

For when you want the evidence before the decision. We look at what you have against the job you want it to do, and give you a prioritised plan with the arithmetic attached. The document is yours either way.

Request a performance audit

Know what you are building? Book a discovery call. Not sure where the problem is? Request the audit. If neither is right for you, we will say so, and tell you what is.

Not ready for either? Talk to the demonstration in your browser for three minutes, or paste your own address and hear it answer as your business. No form and no booking, and the transcript arrives by email a minute later.

Hear it work
A material study photographed in bright daylight. A thin sliver of the monumental pleated turquoise glass wave enters from the right edge of a very wide frame, its fins and one polished silver ribbon catching the light at the crest, above a pearl reflective floor that runs the full width. The left of the frame is an almost empty pale mint room.

A store built around your product.

HUREAL / Material studies