Core Wins
Boosted UK & EU daily conversions through Hyvä Checkout and Mollie payments.
Delivered the entire Hyvä theme overhaul within our regular monthly retainer.
Configured automated tax rules with Linnworks and couriers for uninterrupted EU trade.
Overview
Epic Militaria is one of the UK’s largest WW2 reenactment suppliers. We focus heavily on B2C sales for living history collectors, alongside trade orders for film, theatre, and museums.
I manage the storefront end-to-end. The platform is an older Magento 2 instance that hadn’t been updated for years, with messy legacy catalog data and tight development resources.
My goal has been steadily transforming it from a mid-2010s setup into a fast, modern ecommerce experience while keeping costs strictly controlled.
Visual Transformation
What I Manage Day-to-Day
I direct our external agency on infrastructure and backend tasks rather than writing core Magento code myself. Everything on the storefront CMS and operational side is handled directly by me.
Agency Direction & Testing
I diagnose bugs, isolate issues in DevTools, and write clear specs for our dev agency so we never burn through our 20-hour monthly retainer on discovery.
CMS Landing Pages
I build and maintain custom marketing pages directly in Magento CMS using lightweight HTML, CSS, and vanilla JavaScript without paying for extra modules.
Logistics & Tax Integration
I configure couriers, shipping matrix rates, and international tax rules (IOSS and VOEC) ensuring accurate data flows directly into Linnworks and couriers.
Technical SEO & Discoverability
I optimize Core Web Vitals (improving LCP and eliminating CLS), manage search thesaurus mapping ("Pants" → "Trousers"), and oversee structured metadata.
Challenges & Solutions
Strict 20-Hour Monthly Agency Retainer
Cost ControlMagento development is slow and expensive compared to SaaS platforms. Our agency budget is capped at 20 hours a month for all maintenance, upgrades, and builds.
I pre-diagnose CSS conflicts and JS console errors myself before submitting tickets. By providing exact reproduction steps and markup, the agency skips discovery and gets straight to deployment.
Protecting Conversion Rates Post-Brexit
Cross-BorderNew EU tax rules and US tariff changes threatened international revenue, while our legacy checkout had high cart abandonment rates.
I brought in Mollie payments for localized European payment options and upgraded checkout to Hyvä Checkout. This lifted daily conversions by +20% across UK and EU buyers.
Roadmap Initiatives
Landed-Cost Checkout
Enabling full upfront DDP duties and tax calculation at checkout so international customers pay zero extra fees on delivery.
Category Rework & 301 Redirects
Restructuring our department hierarchy for better organic discoverability, backed by a comprehensive 301 redirect map.
ElasticSuite Search Tuning
Expanding thesaurus rules and attribute weightings so relevant products surface immediately for regional search terms.
Fetch-Based Cart & Filters
Rolling out an AJAX slide-out cart drawer and instant fetch-based category filters to eliminate disruptive full-page reloads.