Headless Commerce Platform

Client: Apex Retail Co.

RetailWebMobile

60% Faster

Page Load Time

2x Increase

Mobile Conversion

35%

Revenue Growth

Overview

Apex Retail Co., a mid-market fashion brand with over 200 SKUs and a growing direct-to-consumer channel, was constrained by a monolithic e-commerce platform that couldn't keep pace with their design ambitions or international expansion plans. We replaced their legacy storefront with a headless commerce architecture that decouples the frontend experience from backend operations, giving their marketing and merchandising teams full creative control without engineering bottlenecks.

Challenge

Apex's previous platform suffered from slow page loads — averaging 4.8 seconds on mobile — which directly suppressed conversion rates and search rankings. Their content team couldn't update landing pages or launch promotional campaigns without developer involvement, creating a weeks-long backlog for even simple changes. The platform also lacked proper internationalization support, blocking planned expansion into European and Asian markets.

Solution

We built a Next.js storefront with static generation for product listing and detail pages, incremental static regeneration for inventory-sensitive content, and edge middleware for geolocation-based pricing and language routing. The backend leverages a composable commerce stack: Shopify as the order management and inventory engine, Contentful as the headless CMS for editorial content, and Algolia for lightning-fast faceted search. A custom cart and checkout flow, optimized for mobile-first interactions, reduced friction from browse to purchase to under three taps.

Technologies Used

  • **Frontend:** Next.js, TypeScript, Tailwind CSS, Framer Motion for micro-interactions
  • **Commerce Engine:** Shopify Storefront API (GraphQL)
  • **CMS:** Contentful for editorial pages, lookbooks, and campaign landing pages
  • **Search:** Algolia InstantSearch with custom ranking rules
  • **Infrastructure:** Vercel (edge functions, ISR), Cloudflare CDN for image optimization
  • **Analytics:** Segment for event tracking, Looker for merchandising dashboards
  • **i18n:** next-intl with 6 locale configurations

    • Results & Outcomes

    Page load times dropped from 4.8 seconds to under 1.9 seconds on mobile — a 60% improvement — which directly contributed to a 2x increase in mobile conversion rates within the first quarter. Revenue grew 35% year-over-year, with the content team now able to publish new landing pages and promotions independently in under an hour. The internationalized storefront launched in four additional markets simultaneously, and Apex's Lighthouse performance score improved from 42 to 94.

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