One cart, six product types, six different shipping and pickup rules. Custom cakes need local pickup scheduling. Digital recipes deliver instantly. Merchandise ships nationally.
Seed to Sprout is a vegan restaurant in Avon-By-The-Sea, NJ. They needed an online store and a cookbook — and infrastructure that the team could operate independently after handoff.
I built the Shopify store from scratch, designed the cookbook with a specialty print designer, then trained their team to operate everything independently.
Routing one cart through six product types
The technical challenge was configuring Shopify to handle different product types through one checkout. Merchandise ships nationally. Shelf-stable products have different rates. Custom cakes require local pickup scheduling. Digital recipes deliver instantly. I configured shipping profiles, pickup calendars, and checkout flows so the system routes each item correctly when customers mix products in one cart.
The cookbook
I brought on a specialty print designer for layout and print specifications while I guided brand consistency and creative direction. Templates for recipe pages with sections for title, cook time, servings, ingredients, step-by-step instructions, and essays. Interactive QR codes throughout — videos and product recommendation lists I built and tested before print. I coordinated the ordering flow between the printer, the Seed to Sprout team, and Shopify.
Training and documentation
I documented every step of Shopify administration as I built it. Troubleshooting guides for consistent issues. The goal was to make myself replaceable through monthly check-ins and knowledge sharing — by the end of the engagement, the team could handle operations independently.
