Every second a page takes to load costs you shoppers. A template store hauls theme code and plugins it never uses. A hand-built one ships only what your store needs, so it loads fast and keeps the sale.
Ecommerce websites, custom-built to load fast and sell.
Hand-built for New Zealand businesses by an Auckland software developer, not dragged from a template. It loads fast and takes real payments — and you own it, top to bottom.
Prefer to talk? Call or text 021 069 9543.
This page · built to score green
100Performance
100SEO
100Accessibility
100Best practices
This page is hand-built and static, no page-builder, no bloat. A store built the same way loads just as fast. Run Lighthouse on it yourself →
A faster store sells more. That's the whole case.
Shopify and Squarespace get you online quickly, and for a simple catalogue they're a fair start. The trouble shows up later: slow themes that cost you sales, plus a monthly bill for the platform and the paid apps most stores end up needing. Over a few years that's real money spent renting, not owning. A custom build costs more up front and fixes the root cause.
You're not renting a theme or paying monthly for apps to plug the gaps. Your store does what you need from day one, without the per-app fees stacking up.
Your catalogue and your checkout, built around how you really sell rather than bent to fit a generic layout. Odd product options and bundles included.
The code and the data sit in your accounts, in your name. No page-builder to keep paying, and nothing holding your store hostage.
Not selling online yet? I also build small-business websites that bring in enquiries, and you can see the full picture on the Olliver Web homepage.
Everything a real store needs to take money.
Product pages with photos and options, sorted into categories your customers can browse without getting lost. Search that actually finds things, and clean markup so products show up on Google.
A cart and a checkout that don't lose people. Real card payments through Stripe or Windcave, straight into your account, with GST handled the way New Zealand expects.
Stock that counts down as things sell, so you don't oversell. Orders land somewhere you can manage them, with confirmation emails sent to the customer automatically.
The same fast pages this whole site runs on, plus the technical SEO that helps your products get found — clean page structure and structured data included.
The payment and data plumbing a store runs on, already shipped.
The hard part of a store is the part customers never see: taking real payments reliably and moving data without losing it. I have exactly that in production. For a New Zealand real-estate agency I built a property-listings platform that takes online payments and sends automated transactional email, with a security-hardening pass and a technical-SEO overhaul on top, which is the same plumbing a real store runs on. I'll be straight with you: I don't have a public storefront to show off yet, so you'd be an early store client, and that's part of why the founding-client pricing is what it is.
For a site you can click right now, here's a recent client rebuild. It's a live tour operator rather than a store, but the job was the same shape a store build is: taking payments-adjacent bookings reliably and moving a business off a dated platform without losing its rankings:
Back to Nature Tours · live client site
A full custom redesign off a dated WordPress and Wix site: fast pages, a CMS the owner runs himself, FareHarbor booking integration, and an SEO migration that kept the old rankings intact.
I'm Daniel Olliver, an Auckland software developer, and I build production systems for a living, including a patient-assessment platform for a UK healthcare provider where the code has to be right. It's all verifiable at danielolliver.com/dev and linkedin.com/in/danielolliver.
A Website Audit — fixed price, risk-free.
Already selling online and it's not converting the way it should? This is the low-risk way to start. I'll pull your store apart and show you where speed, checkout or SEO is costing you sales, with no obligation to go any further.
What you get
- A plain-English audit of your store's speed and SEO, plus the exact points in the checkout where buyers give up.
- A prioritised fix list — the handful of changes that would actually move sales, ranked by impact.
- A clear proposal with real numbers if you want it built, so you can decide either way with no pressure.
Founding-client rate
$100$200
Fixed. Money back in full if you go ahead with a build.
Risk-free: if it's not worth it, you don't pay.
Founding-client rate while I take on my first Auckland clients.
Straight answers.
Custom store or Shopify — which is right for me?
Shopify is a fair start if you want something standard and don't mind the monthly fees. A custom store earns its cost when speed matters for your sales, or when you've outgrown what a theme can do. I'll tell you straight which one fits.
Can I manage products myself?
Yes. You get a plain admin area to add products and keep prices and stock up to date yourself. No calling me for the everyday changes.
What about payments and GST?
Your store takes real card payments through a provider like Stripe or Windcave, straight into your account. Prices and receipts handle GST the way New Zealand expects. I set it up so you're not left configuring it.
Can you migrate my existing store?
Usually, yes. I bring across your products and content, and set up redirects so you keep the Google rankings you already have. The aim is to move platforms without losing sales.
How much does a custom store cost?
Custom stores start around NZ$6,000 and go up with scope. You get a fixed quote up front from the audit, never an open-ended hourly bill.
How long does it take?
Roughly 4–8 weeks from kickoff, depending on how big your catalogue is and what the checkout needs to do. You see it come together the whole way, not just at the end.
Let's build you a store worth checking out.
Tell me what you sell and what the store needs to do, and I'll tell you straight what it would take and roughly what it would cost. Not ready for a build yet? Start with a $100 store audit instead.
Call or text 021 069 9543, or just hit reply — it comes straight to me.