Helping Cosnova make a confident Shopify Plus decision
Overview -PGM Shop Relaunch & B2B Catalog
Cosnova is an internationally known cosmetics company behind brands such as essence and CATRICE. The company already had an existing direct-to-consumer commerce setup in place, but wanted to evaluate whether a different platform approach could reduce complexity, lower operational costs and create a more flexible foundation for the future.
Especial supported Cosnova during this evaluation phase as a senior Shopify Plus consulting partner. Our work focused on feasibility, technical validation, architecture consulting and decision support. We helped the team understand which parts of a future setup could be handled natively by Shopify Plus, where additional development or integrations might be needed and which architectural decisions would have to be made early.
cosnova GmbH
Shopify Plus Consulting & Platform Evaluation
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Feasibility Analysis
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Architecture Consulting
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Tech Q&A
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Migration Assessment
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Decision Support
7 Weeks
1 Senior Shopify Consultant
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1 Solution Architect
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1 Technical Project Lead
Challenges & goals
Cosnova was considering whether Shopify Plus could become the right platform for its future direct-to-consumer commerce setup. The existing setup had become complex and costly to operate, so the team wanted to understand whether a Shopify Plus approach could simplify operations and provide a more cost-efficient alternative.
The key question was not simply whether Shopify Plus could be used. The real question was how Shopify Plus would fit into Cosnova’s organization, technical landscape, and strategic goals.
Cosnova needed a partner who could evaluate the platform honestly, answer detailed stakeholder questions, and make the trade-offs visible before major implementation decisions were made.
Our approach
Our role was to help Cosnova understand what a Shopify Plus migration would involve before committing budget, timeline and internal resources. This included reviewing requirements, answering structured question catalogs, discussing edge cases and supporting architecture decisions around the potential future setup.
Together with the Cosnova teams, we looked at business requirements, expected traffic and transaction volumes, integration needs, functional requirements, security topics and compliance considerations.
Instead of pushing toward a launch at all costs, we focused on clear decision-making. Where Shopify Plus was a good fit, we explained why. Where custom logic, integrations or additional architectural planning would be needed, we made that visible early.
This gave Cosnova a more realistic view of the effort, opportunities and constraints of a possible Shopify Plus migration.
Assess whether Shopify Plus could support Cosnova’s DTC commerce requirements.
Review whether a different platform setup could reduce complexity and long-term operating costs.
Clarify whether a migration could be planned without major disruption to the business.
Create a structured view of what a potential migration would entail.
Roadmap - From platform question to strategic decision
Cosnova’s project started with an open strategic question: could Shopify Plus become a simpler, more cost-efficient foundation for the company’s future DTC commerce setup?
To answer that properly, we worked through the evaluation step by step. We reviewed the existing setup, assessed feasibility, answered technical and organizational questions and helped clarify the architecture that would be required for a potential Shopify Plus migration.
Feasibility Analysis: Understanding what Shopify Plus could really support
A platform migration should never start with assumptions. Before Cosnova could make a decision, the team needed to understand what Shopify Plus would support out of the box, where the platform would need to be extended and which requirements could create additional complexity.
We helped Cosnova evaluate the planned DTC setup from a Shopify Plus perspective. This included looking at commerce workflows, platform capabilities, technical constraints, integration needs and potential areas for custom development.
The goal was not to make Shopify Plus look like the answer to every question. The goal was to create a realistic picture of what a move to Shopify Plus would mean — technically, operationally and commercially.
Technical Q&A: Clear answers for complex stakeholder questions
A platform migration should never start with assumptions. Before Cosnova could make a decision, the team needed to understand what Shopify Plus would support out of the box, where the platform would need to be extended and which requirements could create additional complexity.
We helped Cosnova evaluate the planned DTC setup from a Shopify Plus perspective. This included looking at commerce workflows, platform capabilities, technical constraints, integration needs and potential areas for custom development.
The goal was not to make Shopify Plus look like the answer to every question. The goal was to create a realistic picture of what a move to Shopify Plus would mean — technically, operationally and commercially.
Architecture Consulting: Designing the right foundation before committing
Architecture decisions made early in a commerce project can shape the platform for years. That is why Cosnova needed clarity before moving into implementation.
We supported the team in evaluating architectural options for a potential Shopify Plus setup. This included questions around platform boundaries, custom logic, integrations, data flows and maintainability.
Our consulting helped Cosnova understand which decisions would be critical for a future migration and which areas would need deeper planning before implementation.
Migration Assessment: Planning a potential migration realistically
Based on the evaluation, we helped Cosnova understand what a possible migration path could look like. This included project phases, responsibilities, data migration, integration planning, testing, training and support for the initial phase.
The assessment looked at how product data, customer information and order history could be transferred safely, how existing systems would need to connect and how operational risks could be reduced during a potential transition.
Even though the migration was not carried out, this planning helped Cosnova understand the real effort, dependencies and organizational requirements behind a platform change.
Cost Assessment: Understanding implementation cost and total cost of ownership
A platform decision is never just about license fees. For Cosnova, it was important to understand the full commercial impact of a potential Shopify Plus migration — from the one-time cost of implementation to the long-term total cost of ownership.
We helped the team break down the expected investment across key areas: migration effort, technical setup, integrations, data transfer, custom development, testing, training and ongoing operations. This made it easier to compare the existing setup with a potential Shopify Plus approach in a realistic way, not only from a platform-cost perspective but also in terms of internal effort, maintenance and future scalability.
Outcome & outlook -
Technical clarity for a strategic commerce decision
The assessment confirmed that Shopify Plus would have been a viable and valuable replacement for Cosnova’s existing DTC commerce setup. It could have supported the core requirements while simplifying operations, reducing platform complexity and lowering costs.
A migration would also have required Cosnova to rethink some existing processes and streamline complex features of the previous setup. In many cases, this would have been a benefit rather than a limitation: several of those complexities created limited business value, while adding cost and operational effort.
From a platform perspective, Shopify Plus could have made the DTC channel leaner and more manageable. It would likely have helped reduce the burden of running the business and created a more cost-efficient technical foundation.
But the platform was only one part of the broader DTC business case. Even with a simpler and cheaper Shopify Plus setup, the remaining costs and challenges of operating the channel were too high. The migration would have improved the viability of DTC for Cosnova, but not enough to justify continuing the business.
Cosnova therefore made a clear strategic decision: Shopify Plus was validated as a strong replacement option, but the DTC channel was discontinued before the migration moved forward.
