RAFT Resource Area For Teaching

Seamless Migration and Integration: Non-Profit’s Journey to Shopify with NetSuite Integration

Non-profit organization providing recycled and low-cost STEAM learning materials, and professional development workshops for over 8,000 educators and their 150,000 students in the Bay Area and nationwide.

Terrace performed a migration from legacy e-commerce site to Shopify and integrated the site with NetSuite using Celigo

RAFT (Resource Area For Teaching) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing educators with engaging, hands-on learning resources aligned with national content standards. RAFT offers a wide assortment of products, including art and office supplies, kits, and workshops for both students and teachers. These products are available in their brick-and-mortar store as well as online. Previously, their old website featured kits but was unable to track their full inventory, including donated items, subscriptions, and other products. This limitation led them to transition to Shopify, a leading platform known for its robust e-commerce solutions.

RAFT recognized the need to enhance its online presence and streamline its operations. Initially utilizing legacy e-commerce site that required coding for every single page, RAFT aimed to transition to a more versatile and scalable e-commerce solution that would result in a decrease in site maintenance. Shopify was chosen for its comprehensive features, scalability, and user-friendly interface.

Shopify provided essential features, such as automated abandoned cart emails, which have significantly improved their operations. RAFT is now focused on improving conversions and ensuring accurate tracking. By moving syncing kit inventory to Shopify and expanding their product offerings, RAFT aims to provide a better shopping experience for their customers.

Leveraging Shopify’s available themes with the Basic plan, Terrace customized its storefront to align with its brand identity and provide an enhanced user experience. The out-of-the-box Shopify solution allowed for the launch of the website with minimal customizations, which was essential given the budget constraints.

“One of the biggest challenges we face, which I believe is not uncommon, is managing our unique structure. We operate both a brick-and-mortar store and an online store, each with different pricing strategies for retail, members, and non-members. Terrace did an excellent job setting up tiered pricing for our SKUs. They developed custom discount functionality to implement the three distinct price levels.”
-David Muilenburg
RAFT Chief Operations Officer

The Terrace Consulting Team utilized the Celigo connector to integrate Shopify with NetSuite, ensuring real-time data synchronization between the e-commerce platform and the ERP system which streamlined operations.

The new platform provided RAFT with greater control over site updates and customizations, significantly reducing reliance on coding for every change.

Project
Migration to Shopify and NetSuite integration
Challenge

Code-Dependent Site Management: The legacy e-commerce system required coding for every change, making it cumbersome for marketing and retail teams to implement updates
Scalability Concerns: With a growing product catalog and having different pricing for Members in Retail store and online store, RAFT faced concerns about the scalability of their current platform to support business needs
User Experience: The outdated interface and need of adding subscription feature as well as workshops offering to the site were blocking RAFT from further growth
Budget Constraints: Working within a limited budget while delivering a robust solution

Solution
Migration from legacy e-commerce platform to Shopify and Celigo integration with NetSuite

Technologies
Shopify, SuiteScript, Celigo Shopify/ NetSuite Integration App

“Our previous platform, didn’t provide a great online shopping experience, so we decided it was time to upgrade to something better. As a non-profit organization with a limited budget, we had to balance our current order volume with the costs of running Shopify. We chose the Shopify Basic plan, knowing we can expand and add more features as we grow. For example, we are looking into adding POS to Shopify ecosystem as it will allow us to leverage all functionality that Shopify can offer.
“The transition to Shopify is a definite improvement because we now have much more control over the site’s appearance. Previously, every single page required coding, which was difficult. Shopify offers a lot more customization options, which is a huge advantage. Marketing now has more control and multiple team members can engage with the site daily. Marketing updates the homepage, and the retail team updates featured products or clearance items.”

-David Muilenburg
RAFT Chief Operations Officer
www.raft.net or www.raftstore.net

About RAFT

Founded in San Jose in 1994 RAFT’s mission is to help parents and educators transform a child’s learning experience through hands-on education. They help bridge the education gap for students and communities by offering engaging STEAM resources to encourage the next generation of innovators, problem solvers, and creators. RAFT does this by offering STEAM Project Kits in their Retail store and online, Maker Mobile van visits and makerspace builds, STEAM summer camps, tailored educator workshops, and free online learning activity sheets.

The Terrace Process

Terrace + RAFT

Strategic Rollout:

Terrace Consulting met with RAFT business stakeholders to understand their needs and requirements.
Terrace Consulting executed a phased migration strategy, allowing for testing and refinement at each stage to ensure a seamless transition without disrupting ongoing business operations
Project was performed using agile methodology with weekly status reviews of the progress.
Training and Support: Staff members received comprehensive training on Shopify’s intuitive backend, empowering them to manage the platform effectively.

Results

Improved Control and Customization: The Shopify platform allowed RAFT’s marketing and retail teams to update the site more frequently and independently, enhancing their ability to engage users and promote products effectively.

Enhanced User Experience: The new Shopify site provided a more intuitive and engaging user experience, aligning with RAFT’s brand identity.

Scalability and Performance: Shopify’s robust infrastructure addressed scalability concerns, enabling RAFT to manage a growing product catalog, utilize Shopify’s abandoned cart email functionality to increase conversions, and create opportunities for future marketing campaigns. The RAFT team can now seamlessly manage new product launches and price changes on the site.

Increased Average Number of orders and Order Value: The enhanced website site, informative product pages and streamlined checkout process contributed to a notable increase in the number of orders, translating into improved revenue for RAFT.

In this case study, the transition from WordPress to Shopify Plus marked a crucial turning point for RAFT. By harnessing Shopify’s capabilities and scalability, RAFT effectively tackled ongoing obstacles and strategically positioned itself for long-term expansion in the omni-channel sector. This analysis underscores the significant benefits of a successful platform migration in driving business growth and success.