Migration and replatforming
We move you onto Shopify Plus and keep the customers you already have
- Platform migration
- Subscription migration
- Data and token mapping
- Redirect mapping
- Parallel running
Shopify agency San Diego
Shopify agency San Diego, we work on the store you already have
Design, build, migration, CRO and the work after launch. Take one piece or hand us the lot. You get a number and a date in writing first.
- 150+
- Stores built
- $400M+
- Revenue generated
- 8+
- Years on the platform
- 4.9★
- Average client rating
We've built 150+ stores. Here are a few.
Wellness, sports, personal care. Different catalogs, all already trading when we arrived.
Most of what we're asked to do here isn't a new store. It's a store like yours: working, outgrown, and nobody wants to touch it.
That's fair. A rebuild on a live store is the one project where the downside beats the upside, and you can probably name a brand it went badly for.
So the first question is what breaks if we do nothing. Sometimes the answer is nothing much, and we say so.
In short
Ecomm Wizards is a Shopify agency San Diego brands hire for design, build, migration and CRO. We work on Shopify and Shopify Plus. Most of our jobs are stores that already trade, so we measure what a change would cost you before recommending it.
This city's brands grow up inside their first setup
The categories here sell the same thing repeatedly to the same person, and that shapes the store more than the design does.
A brand like yours installs a subscription app early, usually the cheapest one that works, then builds three years of customers inside it. The catalog grows, the offers get complicated, and the app stops keeping up.
Which is when somebody says the store needs rebuilding. It usually doesn't. What needs moving is underneath it, and that belongs in a different brief.
Three stores that were already trading
This Works
- Vertical
- Wellness and personal care
- What was built
- A replatform onto Shopify Plus for a live store, carrying the existing customer base across
- Outcome
- +38% conversion rate, +45% mobile conversion lift
Wild
- Vertical
- Subscription consumables
- What was built
- A Shopify Plus subscription program built for refills, with churn-reduction flows
- Outcome
- -34% subscription churn, 80K+ monthly subscribers at 12 months
Everlast
- Vertical
- Sports and fitness
- What was built
- A Shopify Plus redesign of an established catalog, rebuilt around the buying path
- Outcome
- +152% conversion rate, +48% total orders
The theme is the last thing you touch
A subscription brand's rebuild is a data migration wearing a redesign's clothes. What goes wrong isn't the layout. It's whether every subscriber survives without being asked for their card again.
The app you move to is not what decides that. Three other things do, and all three sit in the platforms' own docs rather than on a pricing page.
Your plan tier. Shopify's docs put direct card migration on Plus and Enterprise. Below that, the direct route isn't there.
Your processor. Tokens don't move between processors. One app's docs say so outright; another lists six providers it can import from and says nothing else is supported.
Your payment mix. Apple Pay, Google Pay, Venmo and bank details can't be migrated anywhere. Whatever share pays that way re-authorizes, on any platform, however the move is run.
And the move isn't a day. Every platform describes the same shape: old contracts keep billing where they are, and each customer crosses over when they next update their card. Shopify's docs call it the slow drip. You run two systems for months, and sequencing matters more than the build.
What we do
Four things we do, and you can take one or all four
You've picked the platform, so the question is which piece. A Shopify agency San Diego engagement should let you buy them one at a time. Every row below was already trading when we got there.
Design and build
We rebuild the storefront without rebuilding what already works
- Theme development
- Custom development
- Design systems
- Shopify Plus
- Integrations
Subscriptions and retention
We build the recurring side so it survives the next three years of growth
- Subscription setup
- Churn reduction
- Customer portal
- Replenishment logic
- Retention reporting
CRO and testing
We test the changes before you pay to roll them out
- A/B testing
- Landing pages
- Checkout optimization
- Analytics
- Conversion work
Who we build for here
Three categories this city runs on. Each changes something structural in the build, and a Shopify agency San Diego proposal should say which one you are.
Supplements and nutra
Flavor, size and interval are all variants of one product, so the option logic holds three dimensions without the page turning into a form.
What breaks first: Variants get restructured for a redesign and the subscription contracts still point at the old IDs.
Action sports and outdoor
Deep size and fit runs, seasonal collections that turn over completely, often with a dealer channel beside the direct one.
What breaks first: The size chart lives in the theme rather than metafields, so every seasonal rebuild loses it.
Pet and repeat consumables
The reorder cycle is set by the animal, not by you, so the interval is a product decision that belongs on the customer record.
What breaks first: Intervals sit inside the subscription app, so they don't survive a move to a different one.
What actually moves when you change subscription platform
Six rows, read off each platform's own migration docs rather than its pricing page, on 15 September 2026. The lead row decides the project: whether subscribers keep paying without being asked for their card.
| What you're checking | Shopify Subscriptions | Recharge | Skio | Loop |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Payment token portabilityNobody moves them all at once. Tokens follow the processor, not the app, so the next row matters more than this one. | Import supported from four gateways | Vaults on next customer update | Tokens stay in the processor | Import from six providers |
| The limit that actually bitesEach is in the vendor's own docs. None is on a pricing page. Any one turns a migration into a re-acquisition campaign, so check here first. | Direct card migration is Plus and Enterprise only | Checkout Integration to Checkout Integration is not supported | Tokens cannot cross processors | Adyen is new subscriptions only, not migration |
| What never moves, on any of themNot supported for migration on any platform. Whatever share pays this way re-authorizes whichever column you pick. | Apple Pay, Google Pay, Venmo, bank details | Same | Same | Same |
| How the changeover behavesAll four describe the same shape. Customers cross over as they update details, so budget for two systems for months, not a cutover weekend. | Slow drip via a legacy gateway | Old gateway until the customer updates | Processor API keeps billing | External provider until updated natively |
| What does not come with youOnly one vendor says this outright. If the plan after moving is winning back churned subscribers, check that list travels. | Unstated in the migration article | Unstated | Canceled subscriptions cannot be migrated | Unstated |
| Who runs the importThe thresholds tell you whether this is a form or a project with a named contact. | Encrypted PCI-approved import flow | Self-serve under 5,000 rows | Preview, then assisted | Manual under 50 records, assisted above |
Read the second row across. The app is rarely the constraint. Your plan tier, your processor and your payment mix decide most of it, and all three are settled before you shortlist anybody.
So the order is backwards from the usual one. Find out what moves. Decide whether to move. Pick a platform. The theme comes last. Anyone on your Shopify agency San Diego shortlist should give you a re-authorization number before they show you a design.
Four things to find out before anybody quotes you
- What share of your subscribers pay by Apple Pay, Google Pay or Venmo. That share re-authorizes whatever you do.
- Which processor your tokens sit with, and whether the destination reads them.
- Whether you're on Plus, since the direct card route depends on it.
- What a subscriber is worth over twelve months, so the risk has a number against it.
The switching cost nobody quotes
The quote covers the build. It does not cover the subscribers you lose while moving, and that is usually the larger number.
The arithmetic is one line. Subscribers affected, times the share you expect to lose, times what a subscriber is worth.
Worked at an assumed 5% loss, our planning figure rather than a measured one, so substitute your own: 10,000 subscribers at $180 lifetime value, losing 5%, is $90,000. Against a $40,000 build quote the migration is the larger half.
Then re-run it on the wallet share. Say 20% pays by Apple Pay. Those re-authorize, so the exposure sits on 2,000 people rather than the whole base, and sequencing is what moves it.
When we say don't move
If the platform is fine and the churn is a product problem, a migration costs you subscribers and fixes nothing. The most common version we see.
If you're below Plus and your tokens sit with a processor the destination can't read, the move means re-authorizing your base. Sometimes that's still right. Never by accident.
If the complaint is the admin rather than the customer experience, the cheaper fix is configuration on what you already run.
What working with us looks like
Nobody here is down the coast from you, and several agencies on your Shopify agency San Diego shortlist are. So here's what we offer instead.
Everything is built in your accounts
Your repository, your Shopify, your app logins. We work inside them, so there's nothing to hand back.
Whoever builds it is who you message
A shared channel with the developer in it. Not a queue, and not someone relaying questions.
Cutovers happen on your clock
Releases go out on Pacific hours, so somebody your side is awake when the switch flips.
Nothing gets built that wasn't quoted
Your scope, number and date agreed first. If any moves, it goes back through a quote before it reaches a developer.
What you're probably thinking
“There are agencies actually based here. Why would we use a remote one?”
For some work you shouldn't. If you want people in the room, hire people who can be in it.
For a migration it makes little difference. The risky part is data and sequencing, not meetings. What matters is whether whoever does it has moved a base before, and will say what won't survive.
“Our subscription app says the migration is free and easy.”
The import usually is. The exposure isn't in the import.
It's in the share of your base paying by a method that can't be migrated. In whether your tokens read where you're going. In the months you run two systems.
Ask the vendor to put your re-authorization estimate in writing. The good ones will.
“Every agency says they'll be straight with us. Why would yours be?”
You can't tell from a page we wrote about ourselves. Nobody on your Shopify agency San Diego shortlist can prove it in a paragraph, us included.
So the first assessment costs nothing and you keep it, including the part where we say don't move. Every claim in the table names the vendor doc it came from.
What it costs and how it runs
The first week is measurement, not design. Your wallet share, your processor, your plan tier, and what a subscriber is worth. That gives you the exposure number before anything is committed.
Then a scope, a number and a date, in writing. After that the order is data, then parallel billing, then the theme.
Builds run $5,000 to $50,000 depending on how much is custom, and a migration assessment costs a fraction of that. Any Shopify agency San Diego quote should price them separately.
Shopify agency San Diego FAQs
Most won't. Some will. The split is knowable before you start. Cards held with a processor the destination can read usually carry across. Apple Pay, Google Pay, Venmo and bank details aren't supported anywhere, so that share re-authorizes regardless.
Mostly you don't, and that's the aim. A clean migration is invisible: billing continues, dates hold, nothing changes in their account. The people who need telling are the ones who have to act, usually the wallet group.
The old system stays live and billing until the new one proves itself, which is how these run anyway. Rollback is stopping the drip and leaving contracts where they are. What you can't roll back is a subscriber asked to re-enter a card who didn't.
For a straight build, no. For migrating card numbers directly, Shopify's docs put that on Plus and Enterprise. Below that you move by the gradual route instead, which changes the timeline rather than the outcome.
Ours is $5,000 to $50,000 for a build, fixed before we start. A migration assessment on its own costs a fraction of that, and it's the thing worth buying first, because it tells you whether the build is worth buying.
The build is six to eight weeks. The tail is longer, because your customers cross over as they update details. Plan on two billing systems for a few months.
No, and some agencies you're comparing us with do. We're remote, working with brands across the US, and we'd rather say so plainly. What we bring instead is the table above.
No. Subscriptions take up most of this page because that's the migration that goes wrong most expensively here. Your design, build and CRO work is the same either way.
Next step
Send us your subscription setup
You already know which part of the setup you've stopped trusting.
Tell us what you're on and roughly how many subscribers. We'll assess it and hand you the findings:
- What share of your base would have to re-authorize, and why.
- Whether your tokens can be read where you want to go.
- What that exposure is worth against staying put.
It stops at the assessment. The work is quoted separately and you can decline.
No charge, and the numbers are yours whichever way you decide.
A developer who has done one of these replies inside a working day.
