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Custom Shopify themes
High-fidelity Figma to Shopify builds with flexible sections, clean Liquid architecture, and responsive behavior that holds up on real devices.
· Based in India · Shipping worldwide
Complex Shopify architecture, custom systems, and AI products. Shipped by one operator.
I’ve spent 5+ years building Shopify storefronts, multi-reseller commerce systems, forex CRMs, and AI tools. No account managers, no hand-offs — you talk to the person writing the code.
Best fit: DTC brands doing $25k–$250k/month who’ve outgrown theme tweaks.
Shipping0+ yrs
Brands worldwide0+
Products shipped0
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1A little about me
I’m Tanuj. I take builds most agencies scope into three-month engagements and ship them solo — with the architecture done right the first time.
Signing off
tanuj rajput
01
Architecture layer, not theme layer.
Custom commerce systems, middleware, CRMs, and AI integrations — not just storefronts. The work most freelance devs can’t take on.
02
One operator, no hand-offs.
You brief the person who writes the code. Decisions happen in hours, not sprint cycles. No account managers between you and the work.
03
Revenue first.
I build for conversion and retention, not portfolio screenshots. Every engagement is scoped against the number it’s supposed to move.
04
I read ad accounts, not just code.
Five years running Google and Meta ads alongside the builds. I know what the traffic costs before I touch the page — so the build is scoped against CAC and conversion, not aesthetics.
2Shipped for 32+ brands · a selection
3Featured client work
Selected projects.
Storefronts, fintech, custom workflows, migrations. Each one shipped solo, end to end.
Matrix Forex
Fintech · Forex
Fintech platform. Next.js 14 CRM with BullMQ job queues, Prisma, and Google Ads API integration behind a live-rate booking flow. RBI-licensed, 2L+ travellers.
WeMust
Order workflow
A custom print ordering system with live pricing, cart logic, and invoice automation for a production-heavy Shopify workflow.
Mum & You
Platform migration
A Magento → Shopify Plus migration covering subscription logic, data handling, SEO-sensitive redirects, and private app support.
Mahina
Brand storefront
A custom Shopify theme for a fast-growing period care brand, designed around trust, education, and higher-value shopping journeys.
Lilliput
Kids’ Fashion
Shopify build for India’s 20+ year kidswear brand — age-grouped collection filters, WhatsApp ordering, and a storefront tuned for parents who shop on mobile in two minutes between school runs.
Bloom Bodysuit
Women’s Activewear
Editorial Shopify build for a US activewear brand — custom filtering, fast PDPs, and a checkout path tuned for paid traffic.
4Also building
A handful of products.
One operator.
The agency teaches the products. The products teach the agency. Same operator behind every engagement.
5Why solo
Same scope. Half the layers.
You’re not paying for craft; you’re paying for coordination. Here’s what disappears when there’s one operator instead of a tower of them.
Typical agency
With me
Operator- Communication path
- Account manager → PM → dev
- You ↔ me. Direct.
- Decision turnaround
- 3–5 days, after the sprint review
- Same day, often same hour
- Who writes the code
- A vendor you'll never speak to
- The person you briefed
- Scope creep
- Change order. Five-figure addendum
- Negotiated in Slack. Quoted once.
- Post-launch ownership
- Off the contract, off the radar
- One operator, before and after launch
- True cost
- Hidden coordination overhead
- What I quoted is what you pay
Some agencies do this right. Most don’t. If yours does, that’s great — keep them.
6What I take on
Six things I ship
without supervision.
No deliverables theatre. Each card is something I’ll quote, scope, build, and ship inside one engagement.
Performance & Core Web Vitals
Speed audits and implementation work for stores slowed down by heavy apps, unoptimized assets, render-blocking code, or theme bloat.
Conversion & AOV improvements
Mobile UX improvements, bundles, cart nudges, collection strategy, and merchandising flows that make each session more valuable.
Custom systems & integrations
Middleware, CRMs, auth flows, API integrations, and AI tooling. Multi-reseller commerce systems, BullMQ job queues, and the stuff that isn’t a theme.
Store migrations
Careful moves from Magento, WooCommerce, or older Shopify setups with attention to SEO, redirects, product data, and customer records.
MagentoShopify Plus
WooCommerceShopify
Legacy themeOS 2.0
Launch ownership
Requirement clarity, release planning, QA, analytics checks, handoff support, and the communication needed to keep a build moving.
01Scope and roadmap lockedShipped
02Pre-launch QA & analytics checkShipped
03Release, monitoring, and handoffShipped
Need one of these in depth? The dedicated pages carry the scope, transparent pricing, and case studies.
7How it goes
Shape. Build. Launch.
One operator across the whole engagement. No hand-offs, no chain of account managers — just the work, end to end.
Step 01 · Shape
Define the revenue goal, customer path, content model, app constraints, and launch risks before the build starts.
Step 02 · Build
Turn the plan into clean Shopify sections, app logic, responsive interfaces, and reusable systems your team can control.
Step 03 · Launch
QA mobile states, browsers, speed, tracking, forms, redirects, and handoff details before the store goes live.
Boring, well-understood tools. Sharp execution.
Commerce
Shopify, Shopify Plus, Liquid, Online Store 2.0, Storefront API, Admin API, GraphQL, REST APIs
- Shopify
- Liquid
- Hydrogen
- Shopify CLI
Frontend
React, TypeScript, Next.js, Tailwind, SCSS, animation systems, responsive UI, and reusable component thinking
- React
- Next.js
- TypeScript
- Tailwind
Quality
Lighthouse, Core Web Vitals, accessibility checks, browser QA, analytics checks, and launch readiness
- Web Vitals
- A11y
- QA
- Analytics
Product
Chrome extensions, macOS apps, mobile-first storefronts — shipping end-to-end as a solo operator.
- Chrome MV3
- SwiftUI
- Mobile CRO
- Responsive
Growth
Five years running paid traffic alongside the builds — scoping every page against CAC, not aesthetics.
- Google Ads
- Meta Ads
- GA4
- CRO
8Receipts
What teams said
after launch.
A short, honest list — four quotes from teams whose builds you can open in another tab.
The custom print cart had been on someone’s roadmap for eighteen months. He shipped a working version in three weeks. Our ops team got their evenings back.
Aditya Sharma
Operations Lead · WeMust
Migration was the part of our year I dreaded most. He scoped it, ran it, and didn’t lose a single product redirect. Subscriptions worked on day one.
James Whitfield
Head of Digital · Mum & You
Tanuj understood the commercial problem quickly and improved the shopping path without overcomplicating the theme. The store became easier to use and easier for our team to manage.
Rajesh Verma
Digital Marketing Head · Nicobar.com
Tanuj turned a complicated PDP into something our team actually wants to update. Clean Liquid, clear sections, no surprises during launch.
Ananya Desai
Co-founder · Mahina
9
Where I think out loud.
Short posts on building, branding, and what actually moves the needle. No threads about hustle.
Swipe →Follow on LinkedIn
Two or three posts a week. If you want to argue, the comments are open.
Follow on LinkedIn10From the journal
Issue 01 — Field notesNotes from the workbench.
Field notes from real builds. Short, useful, no hype.
- Shopify / Hiring
Freelance Shopify developer vs agency vs marketplace: which should a D2C brand hire?
Marketplace freelancer, senior solo operator, boutique agency, Shopify Plus partner, or a full-time in-house hire — five ways to buy Shopify work, each priced differently and each right for a different brand. Here is the honest comparison for an Indian D2C brand, and the three-question filter that picks the right one.
Jul 17, 20267 min - Shopify / Pricing
Shopify developer hourly & day rates in India (2026)
A Shopify developer in India charges roughly ₹500 to ₹10,000+ an hour depending on tier — but for most D2C projects, hourly is the wrong billing model. Here is the full rate map by tier, day and retainer rates, and when hourly actually serves you versus fixed-scope pricing.
Jul 17, 20265 min - Shopify / Migration
The Shopify migration checklist for Indian D2C brands (Woo, Magento, Wix)
A Shopify migration for an Indian D2C brand fails or ships clean on the same handful of decisions — the redirect map, the data model, the subscription port, and the India-specific stack most checklists ignore. Here is the full checklist, in order, with the Razorpay, COD, and Shiprocket gotchas nobody warns you about.
Jul 17, 202610 min
New entries roughly every other week. Subscribe via the journal for the full archive.
All posts12Before you brief me
Questions before you brief me.
The things a brand asks before hiring a solo operator. Answered here so you don't need a call to get them.
The smallest project that's a good fit is around $3k, usually a focused performance fix or a single conversion experiment with measurable scope. Below that, you're better off with a template or a specialised app rather than custom work. Most of my engagements are in the $4–15k range, with retainers for ongoing work running $2–10k/month.
Both. Retainers are for D2C brands that need a senior pair of hands on the store every week — performance monitoring, ongoing experiments, app vetting, small builds. Projects are for defined scope with a ship date. About 60% of my work is project-based and 40% is retainer.
A theme refresh or section build is 1–2 weeks. A custom theme is 3–6 weeks depending on complexity. An Online Store 1.0 to 2.0 migration is a half-day with the right tooling and a few days without. Performance fixes are usually a week. Custom development that involves apps or external integrations runs 3–8 weeks.
Yes, regularly. About half my work is for brands in India, the other half is spread across the US, UK, UAE, and Singapore. I work in your timezone for live calls and asynchronously for the rest, which is what most brands prefer anyway.
D2C and B2B brands doing roughly $25k–$250k/month, with a clear product and a small team. At that scale you need depth on a real partner, not breadth on an agency org chart. Below that range you're usually better off with templates and apps. Above it, you need an in-house team.
You send me a brief — what you need, what's blocking, the budget range. I reply within 24 hours with a scope estimate and a calendar slot for a 30-min call. After the call, you get a written proposal with a fixed price or a retainer rate, a timeline, and a Definition of Done. If we agree, I start. No long sales cycle.