A new theme switches your apps off.
Your subscriptions, reviews, upsells and tracking are app embeds living inside your current theme. Publish a fresh one and every single one stops, silently, with no error anywhere. We branch the theme you already run instead, so nothing gets turned off to make the site look better.
Your theme, on a branch. Never a replacement.
The standard agency approach is to build a clean theme and publish it. It demos beautifully and it is the single most common way a working store gets quietly broken.
The live theme comes down first
We pull the theme currently running your store, commit it untouched as a baseline, and work from there. Every change after that is a diff against a store that already works, which means we can always show you exactly what changed and always put it back. Starting from a blank theme throws away every customisation and every app embed anyone has added since launch.
Version controlled in a private repo
Your build lives in git, in a private repository, with history. Not in a shared Google Drive folder of zip files named final-v3.
Previewed unpublished
The work sits as an unpublished theme on your own store. You click through the real thing on real data before anything goes live.
You publish, we never do
Publishing a theme is the one irreversible action in a Shopify build, and it belongs to the person whose revenue it is. We hand you a preview you have signed off and you press the button. That is not caution theatre, it is who should own the risk.
Six steps, and the last one is yours.
This order exists because each step protects against a specific way a Shopify build goes wrong, and we have watched every one of them happen.
- 01
Pull the live theme
Text and assets both, size-verified, so nothing is silently missing before work starts.
- 02
Baseline it in git
The untouched theme committed first, so every later change is a readable diff.
- 03
Push to a private repo
Your build gets history, review and a way back. Not a folder of zip files.
- 04
Optimise behind a schema check
Every push gated on a schema pre-flight, because a malformed section schema takes the theme editor down.
- 05
Preview unpublished
On your own store, on your own data, before anything is switched.
- 06
You publish
The irreversible step belongs to you. We do not touch it.
What actually gets delivered.
A store you own, in a repo you own, that you can hand to anyone.
- 01
The store, live
Built on your existing theme, with your apps still working, published by you.
- 02
The repository
Private, with full history. If we part ways you keep it and any developer can pick it up.
- 03
SEO built in
Titles, structured data, clean URLs and speed handled during the build rather than bolted on after.
- 04
No lock-in
No proprietary page builder, no agency-owned account, nothing that stops working if you leave.
Stores we work on.
Published case studies from accounts where the store and the marketing were handled together.
I really enjoy working with Igor. Super knowledgeable, fast, and he takes initiative. Easy to reach, always brings smart strategies, and he built us a full AI dashboard where every result is easy to read. We speak weekly. I'd recommend working with him to anyone.
I just got the AI assistant and I'm absolutely blown away. It feels like I'm Tony Stark. The amount of work I get done now is insane, and I've had zero issues with it.
E-commerce · Truck, van & 4x4 accessories
E-commerce · Fashion
E-commerce · Modest fashion
Three reasons this is different.
We never publish your theme
The only irreversible action in a Shopify build stays with you. Every agency that publishes for you is deciding when your revenue is at risk.
Your apps keep working
Because we branch the theme running them rather than replacing it. This is the failure nobody warns you about and everybody has seen.
The people building run the ads
A store built by the same operator who runs the traffic gets built around what converts, not around what photographs well.
How Shopify builds usually go, against how this one will.
Send us the store. We will tell you what it needs and what it costs.
No hourly meter running
What this connects to.
Custom websites
When Shopify is the wrong shape for the business. Astro, static, fast, no platform tax.
Explore →Landing pages
Pages built for paid traffic specifically, separate from the store templates.
Explore →SEO
A store built to rank still needs someone making it rank. The build is the foundation, not the finish.
Explore →One fixed price per build, agreed before work starts. No hourly meter. Larger scopes quoted after a look at the store.
Get a fixed quoteQuestions, answered.
The ones that come up before every store build.
01Why not just build a new theme?
Because your apps live in the current one. Subscriptions, reviews, upsells, loyalty, tracking, they are app embeds injected into the theme running right now. Publish a fresh theme and every one of them stops at the same moment, with no error message anywhere, and nobody notices until the numbers drop. Branching the live theme keeps all of it and still lets us rebuild everything visible.
02Who publishes the finished site?
You do. Publishing is the one action in a Shopify build that cannot be undone cleanly, and it should be taken by the person whose revenue is exposed. We hand you an unpublished preview on your own store, you click through it on real data, and you press the button when you are ready.
03Do we keep the code?
Yes. Your build lives in a private repository with full history and it is yours. If we stop working together you keep it and any developer can continue from it. No proprietary page builder, no agency-owned account, nothing that breaks when you leave.
04Is SEO included or extra?
The build-time part is included: structured data, title patterns, clean URLs, image handling and speed. That is foundation work and quoting it separately would mean deliberately shipping a worse site to sell the fix. Ongoing SEO, the ranking work, is a separate engagement.
05What if we are already on another platform?
Then the first conversation is whether moving is worth it, and sometimes the answer is no. If it is, the migration needs a redirect map built before anything moves, because that is where site moves lose rankings. We treat that as the main risk of the project rather than an afterthought.
06How long does a build take?
A straightforward store is weeks rather than months, and the number moves with how much content and how many products need reworking rather than with the theme itself. You get the scope and the fixed price before anything starts.
Read the thinking first.
Send us the store. We will scope it.
The URL and what you want changed. We come back with what it needs, what it costs, and what we would leave alone.
Rebuild the store without breaking the store.
We branch what you already run, work in git, and hand it back for you to publish. Your apps never stop.