As the world is moving to ecommerce so fast, many merchants might be in a hurry to deliver their online sales platforms. For businesses that engage with Magento, the development stage comes with many challenges, mainly related to technical and coding skills.
Don’t worry! An experienced Magento web development agency can handle all the challenging parts. With 8+ years of experience working with Magento and other ecommerce platforms, BSS Commerce is a digital transformation partner that you can rely on.
Let’s discover one of our recent works – Optical 88 online store in this post.
Optical 88 Introduction – The Largest Eyewear Retailer in Hongkong
Table of Contents
Optical 88 is among the largest network of eyewear stores in Hong Kong with close to 70 stores in the country alone. The brand is favored by classic and timeless designs, stylish and functional glasses styles and Lens type. Their stores have spread across China and Southeast Asia, including Macau, Singapore, Thailand, and Malaysia.
Retaining the spirit of customer-oriented and pursuit of the highest quality, Optical 88 has continuously improved their product quality and expanded comprehensively over the years with a visual and auditory care business, providing examinations such as comprehensive eye examinations, child myopia control, progressive lens experience and hearing examinations, etc.
In line with the digital age, the brand has to extend their business to the Internet. Through Optical 88 online store, shoppers can order glasses online and make appointments for inspection services anytime, anywhere.
As the business grew, the old ecommerce system did not meet Optical 88’s scalability requirements. Finally, the company has decided to work with BSS Commerce to re-platform the ecommerce website to a more scalable one. And importantly, they expected that the new store would integrate more powerful features. Magento, with features of an open-source platform, is the best choice that fits their requirements so well.
Why BSS Commerce?
Working with our team since 2019, Optical 88 has now been BSS Commerce’s close client. They chose us to be the key partner for their previous Magento web development project. Since they were happy with our service quality and our support, they have kept cooperating with us so far. Optical 88 online store is the latest project we delivered to them.
Project Overview
Client’s expectations
Optical 88 shared with us their plan to create 2 websites, including:
- Corporate site: introduces Optical’s projects, services, and allows appointment booking
- Optical 88 online store: where customers can purchase eyewear online at any time and anywhere.
The company gave us a brief of the ideas of how they wanted the websites to look like with a flowchart to implement on their e-commerce website. All they needed was a functioning, well-integrated and secured website that fits the business size and performances smoothly. Importantly, their sales system combines online and offline (with close to 70 physical stores in Hong Kong), so they want the ecommerce website to be connected with their offline system.
Challenges for BSS Commerce
Challenges that we dealt with the project:
- Heavy workload with rush deadlines
- The business has a unique and complicated POS system, so our team has to integrate it to the Magento 2 site with custom code, without any modules.
- The complex POS system led to the need for self-customization for the loyalty program to be integrated into the website.
Working on such a big project with an extensive client, BSS Commerce had to handle a heavy workload with rush deadlines, which required a good plan and preparation of the best human resources who highly focus on completing all the tasks on time with the highest quality.
Our team even worked overtime and had a night shift to meet client requests of timeline. Along with the rush deadlines, the client also made changes to their request regularly. Those cases required us to clarify the scope of change and prioritization and give the client appropriate advice.
However, the most challenging part of the project was the implementation of the ecommerce website that connects to Optical 88’s offline system. It was important for the business since they are building a loyalty system that is not just for online sales but also fulfilling for offline customers.
BSS Commerce’s Solution
What we did for Optical 88:
- Ecommerce consulting
- UX/UI design
- Magento 2 website development & customization
- System Integration
- Testing by ISTQB QAs
- Ongoing support & optimization
After some discussion, the project started in October 2020 according to the brief. Our team has worked closely with Optical 88’s Ecommerce Manager in the whole project to develop their ecommerce website in the latest version of Magento 2 Open Source.
Being one of the largest eyewear brands in Hong Kong, the traffic to Optical 88 online store was expected to be huge. Accordingly, our specialist has advised the company to select the appropriate server and warned the hosting provider of the peak hours.
The Results
By December 2020: BSS Commerce delivered the Optical 88’s corporate site.
By April 2021: With 8+ years of experience working with Magento, we delivered a strong fit for Optical 88. The online store was officially launched with 3 store views in one instance, including Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, and English.
>>> VISIT Optical 88 Online store: https://eshop.optical88.com.hk/
Highlighted integrations
Building a smart ecommerce system means making management and the ecommerce process easy, in which 3rd-party integrations are musts. It was supposed to be a challenging part of the project; however, we turned it out to be a success.
- ShipAny: ShipAny is a logistics gateway that brings a comprehensive logistics service for the business. There was no way to integrate this gateway into their complex system but to code the solution ourselves and integrate without any 3rd-party module.
- SIS: SIS is a Point-of-Sales system and inventory software that fulfills the important feature of Optical 88’s large retail system. It is a hub where critical management (like sales, inventory management) merges. Like ShipAny, it was integrated into the website by our self-built code.
Highlighted functionalities
- Seft-customized loyalty program
- Bespoke customization
Client Feedback Quotes
As a service provider, BSS Commerce understands that client feedback is more trustworthy than our words. We also believe that the way clients leave us their reviews is also important to prove its reliability. For this reason, we let clients review us through a call interview with Clutch’s specialist – the leading rating and reviews verifier.
A passionate Optical 88’s Ecommerce Manager has spent his valued time having a call with Clutch’s specialist to share his feedback on our service, to which we were very grateful. We hope it will be helpful for those who are considering a Magento 2 website development partner.
“The coding and UI/UX were on point. BSSCommerce always met the deadlines, and everything was delivered in excellent condition. We used Trello and Google Workspace to manage the project, and they responded very quickly to any bugs reported. Overall, it was a fantastic collaboration.
“The process and the quality of the service that BSSCommerce provided were what stood out the most for us.”
“BSSCommerce provides a good quality service with fast response times at an excellent price point. I strongly recommend them to others.” – An Ecommerce Manager at Optical 88
If you are looking for a partner who will accompany you in thriving your ecommerce, please do not hesitate to TALK WITH US if you need our assistance.
BSS Commerce is one of the leading Magento extension providers and web development services in the world. With experienced and certified Magento developers, we commit to bringing high-quality products and services to optimize your business effectively. Furthermore, we offer FREE Installation – FREE 1-year Support and FREE Lifetime Update for every Magento extension.
CONTACT NOW to let us know your problems. We are willing to support you every time.
