Rebuilding three brands in nine months: How Shopify helped The ALDO Group future proof its commerce stack

In 2017, The ALDO Group did what many retailers at the time were doing: they built a composable commerce stack because nothing off the shelf could fully handle their needs. Eight years later, that customization had become a burden — they could build whatever they wanted, but it meant they also had to build everything themselves. Maintenance eclipsed innovation, and it was inhibiting their ability to keep pace with market demands. 

The ALDO Group migrated to Shopify to reverse that ratio and move faster, achieving key results such as:

• Launched three brands in under nine months — on time, on scope, on budget
• Eliminated IT bottlenecks for marketing and merchandising teams
• Reduced release process from hours to seconds with instant deployments
• Achieved +20% YoY conversion increase during the first 2 months of launch
• Positioned for next-generation commerce including contextual commerce and AI-driven personalization

The challenge: The composable promise became a maintenance nightmare

The ALDO Group had begun to encounter significant obstacles that threatened their growth trajectory eight years after building a custom commerce stack. Their architecture, while the right choice at the time, was now creating barriers that prevented them from innovating at the pace the market demanded.

The primary challenges included overwhelming maintenance burden, forced IT dependencies for simple content changes, and accumulating technical debt. What started as a flexible approach to enable features that didn’t exist off the shelf at the time, like having POS and ecommerce connected, had evolved into a system that consumed more engineering resources than the business value it delivered. 

"Our composable approach initially gave us the flexibility we needed for services that didn't exist in any platform," explained Gregoire Baret, VP of Digital Product at The ALDO Group. "But over time, we were spending more time on maintenance and optimization than on innovation. Every expansion initiative was met with technical roadblocks."

The forced dependency between marketing teams and IT had also become particularly problematic. While engineering resources should focus on strategic initiatives and innovation, they were consumed by tickets for simple content module changes or repositioning page elements—tasks that didn't require technical expertise but couldn't be completed without developer involvement.

As a brand with more than 20 years of ecommerce experience, this was especially difficult. Over the years, The ALDO Group had built a culture of rapid testing and optimization which had once put them at the forefront, and they wanted to restore it.

"We were spending more time working around platform limitations than focusing on our core business," Gregoire noted. "It was clear we needed a more robust solution that would let our marketing teams move independently while freeing engineering to focus on what matters."

The solution: An enterprise-grade platform with built-in innovation velocity

The ALDO Group knew they needed a change, and began to consider their options. 

First, they considered whether they might want to refactor their current tech stack, but they decided this would take too long, and there was also the risk that, over time, the same maintenance issues would creep in. Without doubling or tripling their engineering team, they decided this option wasn’t feasible. 

Next, they considered other composable commerce platforms on the market, but after thorough evaluation, realized that they’d present similar overhead to a custom platform. They knew they needed a bigger change—something robust enough for their needs, but also faster and simpler to get them out of maintenance and back to innovation. 

The ALDO Group chose Shopify. 

With 150+ new features shipped every 6 months and a $1.4B R&D investment, Shopify gives The ALDO Group access to cutting-edge commerce capabilities—including AI-native tools, contextual commerce readiness, and next-generation channel integrations—without the maintenance overhead of their previous custom stack.

"What impressed me most was how Shopify eliminated key technical constraints without compromising on innovation," Gregoire explained. "The platform is already ready for what's next—contextual commerce, conversational AI, advanced personalization. These aren't future possibilities, they're working now."

The ecosystem depth of Shopify accelerated The ALDO Group's transformation timeline significantly as well. With thousands of agency partners and apps available, they had access to specialized expertise and pre-built solutions that reduced implementation complexity. For their migration to Shopify, The ALDO Group partnered with CQL, leveraging a co-development approach that combined external Shopify expertise with internal engineering talent.

Together, they rebuilt sites for three brands—ALDO, Sperry, and Call It Spring—in under nine months — an extremely ambitious timeline when you consider the full scope of the implementation, which included not only building three storefronts across two markets each, but also reintegrating with an ERP, adding a PIM (Salsify), adding a new search and discovery solution (Bloomreach), and a loyalty program integration. 

The approach combined CQL's Shopify platform expertise with The ALDO Group's internal engineering team, creating a unified development practice rather than outsourcing the entire project.

"The co-development approach was critical," Gregoire noted. "We augmented our team's capabilities while building internal Shopify expertise. Everyone worked together in the same ceremonies and processes, not as separate teams."

Dave Barr, CQL’s CEO added, “Partnering with The ALDO Group to reimagine their multi-brand digital stack has been a defining moment for CQL. By integrating complex enterprise systems with Shopify’s agility, we delivered a unified foundation for ALDO, Call It Spring, and Sperry that drives speed and autonomy. This collaboration proves that enterprise retail can achieve both global scale and modern simplicity, empowering the ALDO Group to innovate faster than ever.”

The result: Three brands launched in nine months and a return to innovation

The migration to Shopify delivered transformational results for The ALDO Group. They started development in February 2025, and within nine months, had launched fully rebuilt sites for three distinct brands across two markets—completing the project on time, on scope, and on budget. 

The immediate results for the business were impressive: 

• Deployment time reduced from hours-long release processes to instant releases with a single click
• Marketing teams gained increased autonomy for content and merchandising changes eliminating IT bottlenecks
• Technical architecture positioned them for emerging commerce channels including TikTok Shop, ChatGPT integration, and advanced AI-driven personalization

Upon launch, The ALDO Group also gained access to new features and functionality that will hold significant benefits for their end users, such as frictionless checkout, the Shop app, and contextual commerce functionality such as the ability to easily sell on TikTok Shop. 

"The results exceeded our expectations," Gregoire shared. "We delivered three brands in the time it would have taken to refactor our old system—and we got a platform ready for the future of commerce, not just today's requirements."

One of the most symbolic changes came in the release process itself. What previously required scheduled release windows, infrastructure coordination, and hours-long deployments became instant with Shopify. The team demonstrated this transformation by deliberately scheduling a release at 5 PM on a Friday—a time that would have been unthinkable on their previous platform.

"We decided to test ourselves and do a release at the end of the week, Friday at 5 PM—a moment when we absolutely could not do that before," Gregoire explained. "We just clicked the button and went live. The team was asking 'What happens now?' And I said 'Nothing. We're done, it's live.' If there's an issue, we click the other button and roll back. That mental shift—from complex infrastructure processes to instant deployment—symbolizes everything that changed."

The business impact extended beyond technical improvements. Marketing and merchandising teams gained unprecedented autonomy through Shopify's admin interface, eliminating the forced IT dependencies that had slowed execution. Content customization, promotional setup, and merchandising decisions that previously required development tickets now happen in minutes, not days or weeks.

"The empowerment of day-to-day marketing and merchandising teams is a main unlock," Gregoire noted. "Whether it's content management, defining flows for specific segments, or using Sidekick for data analysis—that autonomy is out of the box and part of the platform."

Looking to the future

With the foundation established, The ALDO Group is positioned to leverage additional capabilities over the next year and beyond—they plan on continuing to refine their CRM automation to leverage the best of Shopify native features, flows, and Markets functionality. They’re also on a path to reinforce a unified commerce experience between ecommerce, physical stores, and sales channels.

According to Gregoire, The ALDO Group wanted a platform that is already looking, executing, and supporting what is required to be ready for the new paradigm of commerce, and they found that in Shopify. 

“Digital commerce is not only about buying on a website—it's buying on social networks, on TikTok, in the context of chatbot conversations. Shopify isn't just open to making this happen, it's ready for it already."