Back to Projects
Surplus Quartermasters (surplusqm.com)

Surplus Quartermasters (surplusqm.com)

Rebuilding an acquired store from scratch on Shopify—handling data migration, theme customization, global taxes, and rebranding solo.

Core Wins

100% Solo
Full-Scope Ownership

Handled entire acquisition solo—from data scripts to design, code, and launch.

Automated
Data Migration

Custom Node.js scripts to extract & clean thousands of legacy SKUs from Magento into Shopify.

Landed-Cost
Global Tax & DDP

Upfront duties, IOSS & VOEC tax calculations at checkout with zero fees on delivery.


Overview

When one of our primary military surplus suppliers shuttered operations, we acquired their legacy B2C e-commerce store (forcesuniformandkit.com) a year after its closure. The original platform was severely outdated—built on an obsolete theme, lacking structured meta-data, and possessing zero modern international shipping or tax capabilities.

I ran this entire acquisition revamp solo from start to finish. I rebranded the store to Surplus Quartermasters, wrote custom Node.js data migration scripts to extract and transform catalog data from Magento 2 into Shopify, customized Liquid blocks inside Shopify’s Horizon theme, mapped 301 redirects to preserve search traffic, set up product metafields, and configured global landed-cost checkout.


What I Built & Managed

UI/UX Design, CRO & SEO Ownership
End-to-End Rebrand & Launch
Custom Node.js Data Migration
Shopify Horizon Theme & Liquid
Metafield & Spec Setup
Global Tax & Duty Checkout

Visual Transformation

Homepage Transformation

Before Before Homepage
After After Homepage

Product Page Transformation

Before Before Product Page
After After Product Page

Challenges & Solutions

CHALLENGE

Discontinued Legacy Product Pages

The legacy site had thousands of old product URLs with search traffic, but many items were permanently out of stock or discontinued.

SOLUTION

Rather than serving generic redirects or broken pages, I set discontinued items as unlisted landing pages to preserve search traffic while showing clear links to active products.

CHALLENGE

Outdated Category Structure

Existing categories were messy, disorganized, and didn't allow proper search filtering.

SOLUTION

Rebuilt structured categories from scratch and mapped every old URL to its new equivalent using 301 redirects so we didn't lose search rankings.

CHALLENGE

Dated Brand & Storefront Design

The original store had been closed for over a year, leaving behind an outdated visual layout.

SOLUTION

Installed Shopify's Horizon theme, customized the templates and Liquid code, and launched a fast, modern storefront tailored to our surplus military brand.


Key Achievements

  • UI/UX & Store Layout Ownership: Personally designed all page layouts, engineered Liquid components, and maintain complete ownership over the store’s SEO and CRO strategy.
  • Custom Node.js Data Migration: Built Node.js scripts to extract, clean, and import legacy product data from Magento 2 into Shopify.
  • Shopify Horizon Theme & Liquid: Customized theme templates and engineered custom Liquid blocks for surplus condition grading and spec tables.
  • Metafield Setup: Configured Shopify product metafields to power search filters, spec tables, and feature badges.
  • AI Content App: Built an in-house tool using the Gemini API to update product copy and meta tags automatically.
  • Global Tax & Duty Checkout: Set up tiered international shipping zones with upfront landed-cost calculations (IOSS, Norwegian VOEC, US tariffs, and duties).
  • Sales Channels: Connected Shop Pay alongside direct sales feeds across Google Merchant Center, Meta, Pinterest, and Shop App.

Roadmap Initiatives

  • Hydrogen Headless Storefront: Building a custom React-based Hydrogen storefront using the Shopify Storefront API for sub-second page loads.
  • Native Mobile Shopping App: Building a cross-platform iOS and Android app in Flutter, connecting directly to the headless Shopify GraphQL endpoint.
Previous ProjectEpic Militaria (epicmilitaria.com)
Next ProjectWarehouse Digital Modernization