Headless build + Recharge's API creates a dynamic subscription experience
About
Founded in 2019, Ctrl+Alt+Del is a Shopify Plus development agency specializing in headless ecommerce builds, technical consulting, and web architecture. Their creative approach to audience engagement via headless UX has allowed them to enable ecommerce brands like OffLimits and Cat Person grow and scale to new heights. They’ve also worked with clients like Stojo, Blume, Prima and A24.
Headless builds continue to gain momentum in the ecommerce world and the anatomical name is more than just a buzzword. They allow developers to create a modular and scalable infrastructure that provides the merchant with enhanced flexibility, complete design control, and increased speed. In a more traditional ecommerce build, merchants navigate multiple platforms to accomplish different tasks, such as tracking inventory in one place and posting a marketing blog on another.
A headless build streamlines the process into a singular, fluid by centralizing the tools in a Content Management System (CMS). Recharge’s dynamic API allows for building a subscription checkout in a headless environment quickly and painlessly.
“Because Recharge has an API-focused experience, it definitely makes my life a lot easier. Using the Recharge checkout API allowed me to add a subscription experience in a headless environment really quickly, without a lot of headaches.”
Kevin Green
Founder, CTRL+ALT+DEL
Challenge
OffLimits, a cereal and culture brand founded by Emily Elyse Miller (who without exaggeration wrote the book on Breakfast), wanted to build a non-traditional ecommerce experience. Their goal was to incentivise customers with a toy after repeat purchases - creating nostalgia for the days we dug through cereal boxes as kids searching for the hidden treasure inside.The challenge was creating a headless build with a custom loyalty platform injected into the CMS. This headless build would be modular and scalable to ensure the client had flexibility on the backend without cumbersome plugins or lack of flexible content fields.
Solution
OffLimits created a custom headless store using the CMS, Sanity. Shopify BUY SDK was used to manage inventory and pricing while Recharge handled the checkout and subscription management.
OffLimits is a unique and effortlessly cool build. In addition to vibrant colors and interactive visuals they also integrated a custom reward platform into their CMS.
Customers accumulate points for one-time product purchases and double points for subscription purchases. The featured toys on the store can’t be purchased outright and are only redeemable through these accumulated points.
There are also hidden easter eggs across the site (like the 10 Gold Stars you can find peppered around various pages) to keep engagement high.
Results
With their new headless store, OffLimits saw massive improvements in customer response to the website. The upgraded was seamless, intuitive, and 3X faster. And customers appreciated the changes—checkout conversion rate grew by 22%. By overhauling their site and investing in customer experience, OffLimits was able to box 500+ toys in the first month of launch.
“Because we did this in a headless way, it's opened up a lot of really custom experiences in terms of how we can handle both subscriptions and product purchasing and fulfillment.”
Kevin Green
Founder, CTRL+ALT+DEL
