How the fashion brand QS was scaled into an independent D2C brand in just six weeks through an agile Shopify rollout – despite corporate bureaucracy and technical hurdles.
This case study illustrates how a spin-off within the S. Oliver Group was successfully executed with a radical focus on solutions, UX design, and smart integration of existing systems. It is aimed at investors, partners, and other Shopify clients facing similar challenges, and demonstrates the scalability of direct-to-consumer brands even within a corporate environment.
Background: From Corporate Brand to Standalone D2C Brand
QS had long been integrated as a sub-label in s.Oliver’s main online store and had no online presence or digital identity of its own. In spring 2025, a strategic decision was made to reposition QS as an independent lifestyle brand and sell directly to end customers.
In a matter of weeks, multiple initiatives were launched to support the relaunch: On May 3, 2025, QS opened its first flagship store in Würzburg and simultaneously went live with a new online shop, accompanied by an exclusive capsule collection featuring brand ambassador Vanessa Mai – all as the kickoff to a new, independent brand identity. The brand heavily focuses on community building: customers can upload their own styles, share looks, and inspire each other on the new website – the online shop is not just a sales channel, but an interactive platform for the QS community.
"QS is more than just a fashion brand – we see ourselves as a platform for people who want to show their style and attitude. The new store, the online shop and our community activations create places where exactly that becomes visible – both offline and online."
– Benjamin Isenheim, Brand Director of QS
This repositioning marked the transformation of QS into a fully-fledged direct-to-consumer brand within the S. Oliver Group. For the implementation of the online store, this meant building an independent shop with a clear brand experience in the shortest time – in sync with the retail launch and without destabilizing the parent company’s established structures.
Challenges in a Corporate Environment
- Bureaucracy & slow decision-making: As part of a large multi-brand corporation, every decision had to go through numerous rounds of approval. Sign-offs – from branding to IT security – dragged on. Rigid processes and compliance requirements made rapid iterations difficult.
- Internal role conflicts: Unclear responsibilities led to friction. The QS brand team sought autonomy and speed, while the corporate IT and e-commerce departments held on to established procedures. The question of who had authority over the new D2C shop was not clearly settled at first, leading to delays in project management.
- Extensive coordination: Launching a dedicated QS shop required involving many stakeholders (marketing, sales, IT, logistics, legal, etc.). All needed to give their approval, which brought a high coordination effort. Meetings, presentations, and feedback rounds were the order of the day and threatened to derail the tight schedule.
- Technical starting point: QS lacked internal e-commerce know-how regarding platform selection and operation. Additionally, existing enterprise systems (especially the central ERP) had to be connected, which were not originally designed for a fast D2C implementation. Gaps in the tech stack – for example in automatic inventory or order transfer – meant that manual workarounds would be needed to ensure smooth operations at launch.
Solution Approach: Radically Solution-Oriented Execution
The Shopify agency overseeing the project – led by project manager Benedikt Böhnke and technical lead Benedikt Mühlberger – responded to these challenges with a radically solution-oriented approach. Instead of getting slowed down by corporate processes, the team concentrated on finding pragmatic solutions for each obstacle and making results visible quickly:
- Agile approach & clear priorities: The project team deliberately chose to keep decision-making quick and streamlined. In agreement with QS, a small core team was empowered to make decisions autonomously within defined guardrails. This allowed many details to be resolved without having to go through the entire corporate hierarchy each time.
- MVP mindset: Not all nice-to-have features needed to be ready for launch – more important was delivering a functional shop with core features in six weeks. Additional features were deferred to Phase 2.
- Rapid theme customization with design focus: To save time, the team relied on a proven Shopify theme as a base framework. It was extensively customized in record time until it reflected QS’s youthful, urban brand aesthetic. A strong focus on design was central: despite the short timeline, the new shop needed to look premium and convey the target audience’s lifestyle. Colors, typography, and imagery closely followed the brand DNA. Thanks to Shopify’s flexible theme system, the frontend was tailored within days without reinventing the wheel.
- Close collaboration & transparency: The agency team worked in daily sprints and continuously shared progress with all stakeholders. Early prototypes and Shopify store preview links enabled the QS management as well as corporate decision-makers to provide change requests in parallel with the development process, rather than only at the end. This transparency helped build trust and dispel concerns quickly.
- Workarounds for technical gaps: Where the existing system landscape (e.g. the SAP ERP) could not be fully integrated in the short time, interim solutions were created. For example, inventory reconciliation at launch was partly done through manual data imports to keep sales channels in sync. Orders from Shopify were initially fed into the ERP via CSV import until an automated API integration could be implemented later. These pragmatic workarounds ensured that no technical blocker delayed the launch – a conscious trade-off of perfection vs. timing.
- Focus on UX and performance: In parallel to backend integration, great importance was placed on UX implementation. A mobile-first optimization and clear user journey were essential, since the young QS target audience shops primarily on mobile. Features like the “Shop the Look” section and integration of social media content (#funiswhereyouare) made the shop lively and encouraged community interaction – exactly in line with the brand positioning. Despite time pressure, there was small-scale user testing to make the checkout flow and navigation as smooth as possible.
"Despite the corporate structures, we managed to bring QS live in record time by staying focused and keeping processes lean."
– Benedikt Böhnke, Project Lead for the QS launch (Shopify agency partner)
The team’s mantra was: Act, don’t hesitate. This spirit ensured that the project overcame all internal resistance and was indeed brought from kick-off to go-live within six weeks. While the corporation was still working through coordination processes, the agile team was creating facts on the ground – always with the goal of being online in time for the store opening.
Tech Stack and Integration
The Symmetry theme by Clean Canvas served as the foundation for the frontend, as it comes with many standard features and its modular architecture allowed quick adaptation to the QS brand world. Beyond that, the following technical solutions were implemented to accommodate the complex product catalog and unique requirements without jeopardizing the agile project approach:
- Shopify Flow automations:
– Blacklisting of variants: Due to the multitude of product variants, a logic was set up to automatically exclude non-relevant or unavailable variants (blacklisting).
– Dynamic collection creation: Complex collections are defined using nested AND/OR conditions and automatically populated via Shopify Flow, without the need for external scripts. - Middleware & data pipelines:
– Kafka-based data integration: The entire product master database is updated in real-time via middleware based on Apache Kafka. This means new items, price changes, and stock levels are available in the shop without delay.
– IFORA pricing integration: External price lists are fetched in real time via API and imported on-the-fly into Shopify, eliminating manual price updates. - Third-party integrations to boost conversion:
– SAIZ size advisor tool: A sizing recommendation tool from SAIZ was seamlessly integrated to reduce return rates and support purchase decisions (already in use on the s.Oliver website).
– ParcelLab tracking & returns: The integration of ParcelLab provides transparent shipping and returns information directly in the customer account and via email communication. - UX optimizations on the product page:
– Care instructions and extended product data: Care guides and other technical details are displayed directly on the product page by pulling them from the central ERP and presenting them in a clear way.
– Modular components: Reusable UI components for material and size information ensure consistency and easy extensibility. - Outlook: Headless approach with Coveo: As a next step, we plan to run the PDPs in a headless framework and use Coveo for recommendations, search, and filtering to dynamically sort product listings. This should further increase personalization and optimize the conversion rate.
With these enhancements, the standard capabilities of Shopify Plus were augmented with targeted, modular features that remain scalable and make future adjustments easier. Thanks to the thoughtful use of Shopify Flow, middleware technologies, and third-party tools, a technically sophisticated shop was realized in a short time that meets the demands of a D2C pioneer brand.
Outcome: Successful Launch and Scalable Growth
Despite all obstacles, QS went live on schedule: on May 3, 2025, simultaneously with the store opening, the online shop was available at https://www.thisisqs.com
The launch was closely aligned with marketing activities – the collaboration with Vanessa Mai and the community focus paid off. Within the first weeks, the shop recorded strong traffic and sales, driven by social media buzz and the pre-opening event.
In a short time, QS established itself digitally as a clearly positioned brand with its own identity, separate from the previous s.Oliver parent system. This growth was achieved without requiring a large e-commerce team – thanks to the easy-to-use Shopify platform, the QS marketing team can make many store adjustments on its own. Operations are efficient: updates, new products, and campaigns can be rolled out in-house quickly, allowing QS to react agilely to trends (e.g. short-term drops and collaborations). At the same time, the solution is technically robust and highly scalable, smoothly handling traffic peaks (for example, from promotional campaigns).
Furthermore, the project brought about a shift internally: QS’s success as a D2C pioneer within the S. Oliver Group now serves as a blueprint for future digital brand initiatives in the company. It showed that direct-to-consumer channels can be built quickly and effectively by applying agile methods and using modern platforms.
Investor Takeaway: The QS case study exemplifies how scalable D2C business models can be realized in a corporate environment. By using Shopify Plus and focusing on customer experience, a new revenue channel with significant growth potential was created in the shortest time – without lengthy IT projects. This agility and scalability underscores the value of direct brand-customer relationships: QS now has a direct line to its target audience and valuable first-party data, which leads to long-term competitive advantages. For the S. Oliver Group, the success of QS shows that investments in flexible technologies and agile teams pay off – an inspiring success story for further digital initiatives in the company.
