From Salesforce to Shopify Plus: How we helped fahrrad.de make a fresh start

Fahrrad.de has been the top address for buying bicycles online for many years.

Cyclists can find everything they need here, whether it's an e-bike, bicycle or suitable accessories. The online retailer sells its range in six countries and also offers personal advice in its stores in Germany.

However, things did not always run so smoothly. Due to the financial difficulties of Signa Sports United, fahrrad.de also slipped into insolvency. In 2024, however, the original founder René Köhler took the helm again, bought valuable assets such as the domains and trademark rights of fahrrad.de and Bikester out of insolvency and helped the brands get off to a fresh, promising start. Read this article to find out how we supported fahrrad.de here.

At a glance - what we implemented for fahrrad.de:

• Migration from Salesforce to Shopify Plus

• Store creation

• Internationalization

• Migration of orders, customer data and products

• Integration of the Wishlist King, Klaviyo and Gorgias tools

• Integration of leasing and financing options

The fahrrad.de brand

fahrrad.de is an online store for bicycles, e-bikes and matching accessories. With a wide range of products, from everyday bikes to professional bikes and innovative e-bikes, the brand is aimed at hobby cyclists, commuters and sports enthusiasts alike.

The brand was founded by René Köhler, who focused on high-quality products and excellent customer service right from the start. fahrrad.de quickly made a name for itself and is now known for its variety, quality and expertise in the field of cycling.

Following the insolvency of Signa Sports United in March 2024, fahrrad.de returned to its roots. René Köhler, the original founder, took over the brand again and initiated a comprehensive relaunch - with Shopify Plus and Latori.

The switch to Shopify Plus: Why it was necessary and why Shopify was chosen

When fahrrad.de Bikester GmbH was founded, the company deliberately moved away from its previous basis on Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Instead, the brand simply took over the domains and built the technical infrastructure and online stores from scratch.

At the beginning of the reorganization of fahrrad.de, the challenge was to find a system that could provide both the online store and the backend reliably, quickly and easily “out of the box”. The choice fell on Shopify - a system that is convincing in many respects and fits fahrrad.de's requirements perfectly.

“Shopify offers us reliable process solutions in so many areas that we were able to concentrate fully on the relaunch and setup of the new company,” says Jennifer Geiss, Head of Shop & Data Management at fahrrad.de.

Thanks to numerous integrated solutions, the team was able to concentrate fully on the relaunch and the development of the new structure. The ready-made payment connections and the appstore economy were particularly helpful, as they made it possible to solve many challenges within a few hours.

Another major advantage was the flexibility of Shopify Markets. This made it possible to operate all of fahrrad.de's international stores on a single instance - an efficient and scalable solution that fits perfectly with the company's international ambitions.

Jennifer Geiss, Head of Shop & Data Management at fahrrad.de, reveals in an interview that Shopify was the right choice:

“Shopify was the right decision for us, as it enabled us to set up a good international web store very quickly, which we are now expanding and optimizing step by step.”

fahrrad.de is also completely satisfied with Latori's work. Jennifer Geiss tells us:

“We are very satisfied with Latori. Our project manager and the development team are not only very good professionally, they also fit in very well with our team on a personal level.”

The migration: how we implemented the project

When fahrrad.de decided to switch to Shopify Plus, the challenge lay not only in the technical migration, but also in the design of a modern and user-friendly store. In addition, 6 online stores in 3 languages and a POS connection for the branches were to be implemented in just 6 weeks. Our team first rebuilt the store structure and then securely transferred all relevant data, such as orders, customer profiles and product information.

Internationalization was an essential part of the project. We added four languages to the store, including French and Dutch, in order to meet the growing demands of international customers.

In addition, we have developed customer-oriented features that improve the shopping experience. A special filter function for subcategories of the collection page has been programmed to facilitate the product search. At the same time, we comprehensively revised the product data in order to present it optimally in the front end. The project was rounded off by the creation of country-specific SEO logic, which ensures that fahrrad.de is successfully visible in every market. We also took on the integration of financing with Targobank and the payment process for bike leasing.

Project manager Xuan Yen (Na) Theisen-Trinh summarizes the project as follows:

What does the future of fahrrad.de look like and what has already changed since the migration?

The onsite performance of fahrrad.de shows a clear improvement month after month. Of course, this development is partly due to the strong seasonal nature of the bike industry, which varies depending on the time of year. However, an even more important factor is the continuous development of the online store. Since the go-live, new functions and optimizations have been introduced on a weekly basis in order to continuously improve the shopping experience for customers.

Among other things, fahrrad.de uses the average revenue per visitor as a key indicator to measure the performance of the website. Although the company keeps specific figures to itself, the positive effects of the continuous adjustments are unmistakable.

In addition to optimizing the online store, fahrrad.de is also working on introducing new services and creating a seamless customer experience. One particular goal is to link stationary stores and the online store in order to offer customers a consistent and seamless shopping experience - regardless of whether they want to shop online or on site.