Luxury fragrance
DYNAMO Perfumes
An editorial, magazine-style Shopify storefront for a luxury fragrance house — custom Horizon theme, no sliders, no generic sections.
Sales increased 50x following the storefront launch.
Remote · Worldwide
Service 02 of 05
Ecommerce Development
Storefronts built to convert, not just load.
We design and build Shopify, Shopify Plus, and headless storefronts — engineered for speed, merchandising flexibility, and checkout conversion.
(01) The short answer
What is ecommerce development?
Ecommerce development is the design and build of an online storefront — merchandising, product discovery, and checkout — along with the performance work that keeps it fast under real traffic. Cortexley builds on Shopify, Shopify Plus, WooCommerce, and headless stacks, and has shipped live storefronts for fragrance, haircare, and eyewear brands.
(02) Cost & timeline
How much does ecommerce development cost?
A custom Shopify store typically costs £2,000–£7,000 and takes 4–8 weeks. A Shopify Plus build with custom checkout logic, or a migration to Shopify, typically costs £8,000–£20,000 and takes 6–12 weeks. Fully headless storefronts start around £15,000.
(03) What's included
Ecommerce development scope, without the fine print.
- 01Custom Shopify & Shopify Plus theme development
- 02Headless commerce with Next.js + Shopify/Commerce Layer
- 03WooCommerce builds for content-driven storefronts
- 04Migration from legacy platforms with zero data loss
- 05Subscription, bundling, and custom checkout logic
- 06Performance audits and Core Web Vitals optimisation
Built withShopify PlusLiquidHydrogenWooCommerceNext.jsCommerce Layer
(04) How the engagement runs
Our ecommerce development process, from brief to launch.
Audit
We map your current funnel, tech debt, and merchandising needs before writing a line of code.
Design system
A component-driven design system built for the storefront, not a set of disconnected pages.
Build
Theme or headless build with performance budgets enforced from day one.
QA & launch
Cross-device testing, staged rollout, and a launch checklist that covers analytics and tracking.
Post-launch support
Monitoring, iteration, and a direct line to the team that built it.
(05) Proof
Related ecommerce development work.
Natural skincare
MK Terra
A natural-skincare Shopify store on the Ritual theme, redesigned in the brand's olive, charcoal and beige — backed by Meta ad campaigns.
Ecommerce
Botanica
A Shopify storefront for a Pakistani haircare brand, built for clear product storytelling and a smooth mobile checkout.
Sales increased following the storefront launch.
(06) From the blog
Further reading on ecommerce development.
Ecommerce · 8 min read
Shopify Plus vs. Headless Commerce: Cost, Timeline, and How We Actually Decide
Headless Shopify costs 2–3× more to build than Shopify Plus and takes twice as long. Here's the pricing breakdown and how we decide which one a project actually needs.
Read article →Ecommerce · 8 min read
How Much Does an Ecommerce Website Cost to Build in 2026?
A realistic breakdown of what drives ecommerce build costs — from a basic Shopify theme to a fully custom headless storefront — and how to scope your project before requesting quotes.
Read article →Ecommerce · 8 min read
Shopify Migration Checklist: Everything to Do Before, During, and After Cutover
The complete Shopify migration checklist: redirect mapping, data export, pre-launch QA, cutover steps, and what to verify in the first 72 hours — with full coverage of SEO preservation.
Read article →(07) Questions
Ecommerce development FAQs.
Both. We can extend a well-built existing theme or start from a blank canvas depending on your timeline and how far your current setup is from where you need to be.
Yes — we've handled migrations from Magento, custom PHP carts, and BigCommerce, preserving SEO equity and historical order data.
Most Shopify Plus rebuilds take 6–12 weeks, depending on catalogue complexity, custom checkout requirements, and third-party integrations. A standard Shopify store takes 4–8 weeks.
We keep design and engineering under one team, so your storefront doesn't get diluted through handoffs — merchandising flexibility and performance work are built in from day one, not bolted on after launch.
Shopify is where most of our storefront work lands. Our Shopify developers have shipped a custom Prestige theme build for a fragrance launch, a virtual try-on integration for prescription eyewear, and a cash-on-delivery checkout flow for the Pakistani market — all on live stores. We also build headless and WooCommerce when the roadmap genuinely calls for it.
(08) Start here
Tell us what you're building.
A founder reads every brief and replies within one business day with honest next steps and a fixed-price proposal.
sales@cortexley.com