Maine Sport Outfitters (MSO) is a well-established outdoor retailer with three locations in Midcoast Maine, serving their community for over 50 years.
Despite MSO's successful brick-and-mortar operation across three locations, the COVID-19 pandemic caused an unprecedented decline in walk-in shopping. The company needed to rapidly transition from their WordPress-based website to an integrated e-commerce system. The key challenge was ensuring seamless integration with their existing Lightspeed inventory and POS system.
Working closely with the MSO team, we developed and implemented a connection to their Lightspeed system. This required careful attention to detail as we refined an integration with a system that had never before needed to connect with an external front-end. Our team tackled multiple complex tasks to ensure a smooth transition. We supported MSO in sourcing proper UPCs for their thousands of products, enabling integration with Google Shopping. We also worked with brand partners to source and map product images, ensuring a professional and consistent presentation across their digital storefront. To complete the foundation, we implemented a functional tagging system that built out corresponding Shopify Collections, making their extensive inventory easily navigable for customers.
The transformation was completed in under five months, resulting in a fully operational Shopify store with a stable, reliable connection to MSO's Lightspeed ERP. This new digital infrastructure proved crucial during the early pandemic period, allowing the business to continue serving customers when in-person shopping was limited. The integration provided customers with real-time inventory information across all three locations, significantly improving the shopping experience. Additionally, the new system established a solid foundation for future marketing initiatives through its product feed capabilities. Through this digital transformation, MSO was able to not only weather the challenges of the pandemic but also position themselves for future growth in the e-commerce space.
