Unified commerce and a smarter gift registry for the baby store Jo+Liz
Sisters Jolien & Liselot, the founders of Jo + Liz
Jo + Liz is a Belgian baby concept store founded by sisters Jolien & Liselot. They chose to combine a warm in-store experience with a strong online presence. Birth lists (gift registries) are at the heart of their business, for parents preparing for a new arrival and for friends and family looking for the perfect gift.
The challenge
Before working with us, Jo + Liz were running two completely separate systems: a WooCommerce webshop and Lightspeed retail POS. And the two simply didn’t talk to each other.
That caused a lof of daily frustration:
- Online and offline stock was constantly out of sync
- Customers could buy items online that were already sold in-store
- Staff manually copied orders between systems to reduce errors
- Birth lists added a whole extra layer of complexity
Birth lists are not just a 'nice-to-have' for a baby store, but an important revenue driver. Every inventory mistake, every registry error, every “sorry, this item is actually sold out” moment directly impacted trust and conversion.
Jo + Liz knew this wasn’t sustainable. “WooCommerce’s gift list system for example automatically deducted every item added to a list from our available stock. Once we opened a physical store, that quickly became unmanageable,” Jolien and Liselot explain. "It became a real issue that WooCommerce and Lightspeed don't connect well."
After seeing a similar case we built for another baby retailer, they reached out looking for a modern, unified and stable setup.
Our approach
We rebuilt their digital foundation around Shopify, with a strong focus on unified commerce and gift registry workflows that actually work in real life, both online and in-store.
1. A cleaner, more intuitive Shopify store
We customised a new Shopify theme to improve category structure and navigation, product discoverability and merchandising for parents and gift buyers.
The goal wasn’t just a good looking design: it was clarity, ease of use, and fewer mistakes.
2. A smart gift registry with Swym
For birth lists, we implemented and deeply customised the Swym Gift Registry app.
Why Swym?
- It supports both Shopify Online and Shopify POS
- It handles inventory reservations and real-time updates across channels
- It’s flexible enough to support complex baby-store workflows
- And their support team allowed us to push the system further than standard setups
Key features we built:
- Instant registry creation during shopping (“add to registry → log in → registry created”)
- Custom UX flows matching Jo + Liz’s brand
- Registry search by family name
- iI-store POS flows where staff can sell items directly from a registry
Every baby store faces the same core challenges. The combination of Shopify + POS + Swym solves them better than anything else on the market when implemented correctly.
The result
Jo + Liz now runs on a fully unified commerce setup. Gift registries may look simple, until you actually try to build one properly.
We tackled edge cases like:
- Products reserved in-store before being added to a registry
- Inventory that must sometimes be held and sometimes released
Gifts bought online needing to be marked as “fulfilled” automatically - Customers switching between online and offline shopping
This required close collaboration between Jo + Liz, our team, and Swym’s support, but we were able to build a gift registry that works flawlessly, for buyers, receivers and the Jo+Liz team.
Now, parents can open a registry in seconds, and not having to worry about adding things that are no longer in stock. Jo+Liz doesn't have to spend time on syncing between system and spend less time on managing birth lists. This all leads to a higher conversion on gift purchases, fewer refunds due to stock errors and reduced admin.
“We loved working with dear digital, we felt we could ask any question at any time, and dear digital would help us out. It doesn’t feel like working with a corporate, but with a team of real people.”
- Jolien
Birth lists are the heart of baby retail, and Jo + Liz now has a setup that actually works for them. This case shows how unified commerce, when done right, goes way beyond tech: it builds trust, saves time and supports real growth.
