Industries — who we serve

Coffee & Beverage

Coffee and beverage brands sell a ritual, not just a product. Winning online means nailing subscriptions, freshness and shipping logistics, and a brand people want to reorder every week. We build Shopify stores and retention programs for roasters, bottlers, and specialty-food makers — work that earned First Pier a national Clutch award for Food & Beverage ecommerce.

Featured result

Top F&B

E-Commerce Developers — Clutch, U.S.

9x

Peak ROAS on paid (Ragged Coast)

Since 2009

in ecommerce

Portland, ME

Specialty-food & beverage roots

40+

documented Shopify case studies

Since 2009

in ecommerce

Portland, ME

senior-led team

Top E-Comm Dev

Clutch 2026 · U.S.

The challenges we solve

Selling considered products online isn’t like selling impulse buys. These are the headwinds the category throws at you — and a generic Shopify build doesn’t address any of them.

Subscriptions & reorders

The best beverage revenue is recurring. Subscription UX and retention flows turn first sips into standing orders.

Freshness & shipping logistics

Perishable, heavy, and time-sensitive shipments make fulfillment and shipping strategy central to the experience.

Standing out on a crowded shelf

Specialty coffee and beverage is packed. Brand, story, and content are what earn the click and the loyalty.

Sampling & the first purchase

Taste sells. Bundles, samplers, and gifting lower the barrier to that important first order.

Wholesale + D2C in one store

Cafés, retail, and direct customers each need different pricing and flows without fragmenting your catalog.

How we grow your brand

Three levers that actually move the needle

01 · Convert

Convert the researcher

We turn dense product knowledge into buying confidence — PDPs that answer the real questions, comparison and finder tools, and CRO tested against your actual traffic, not best-practice guesswork.

02 · Acquire

Acquire efficiently

Paid search and paid social built around your margins and seasonality, not vanity ROAS — so growth is profitable, not just big.

03 · Retain

Grow lifetime value

Email, SMS, loyalty, and post-purchase experiences that turn a first-time buyer into a repeat customer and a referral source.

The First Pier method — how every engagement runs

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Strategize

Tie every build to a growth outcome.

Hand-drawn integrate puzzle pieces

Integrate

Connect the tools and data that run the store.

Hand-drawn measure graph

Measure

Prove it in revenue, retention, and ROAS.

Hand-drawn iterate loop

Iterate

Ship, learn, refine in fast sprints.

Results we’ve delivered

A woman standing in front of a window

Shipping Strategy for Tandem Coffee

A shipping and threshold review for Portland roaster Tandem Coffee that lifted average order value 5% with no drop in conversion.

Two cell phones sitting next to each other on a table

PPC & SEM for Ragged Coast Chocolates

PPC and SEM for Ragged Coast Chocolates delivering 9x average ROAS, a 40% Q4 sales lift, and 46% growth in new customers.

Collateral Design for Two Fat Cats Bakery

A full collateral suite of menus, signage, packaging, apparel, and van livery, giving a Portland bakery institution one consistent physical presence.

A bottle of blueberries next to a bag of blueberries

Subscription Strategy for Wyman's

Recharge subscriptions for Wyman's wild blueberry products, raising customer lifetime value 400% and return-customer rate 300%.

What we bring to your store

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Shopify & Shopify Plus development

Stores built for technical, variant-heavy catalogs — fast and ready to scale.

A bright blue hand drawn arrow facing right that is part of First Pier's brand colors and patterns

Conversion rate optimization

Testing and buying-guide UX that converts high-consideration traffic.

A bright blue hand drawn arrow facing right that is part of First Pier's brand colors and patterns

Paid search & paid social

Google Ads and Meta built around your margins and seasonality.

A bright blue hand drawn arrow facing right that is part of First Pier's brand colors and patterns

Klaviyo email & SMS

Flows and campaigns that carry customers across seasons.

A bright blue hand drawn arrow facing right that is part of First Pier's brand colors and patterns

Retention & loyalty

Programs that reward repeat and referral-driven customers.

A bright blue hand drawn arrow facing right that is part of First Pier's brand colors and patterns

Migration to Shopify

Move off a legacy platform without losing SEO or sales.

Why brands choose First Pier

Senior team, no handoffs

You work directly with the people doing the work — senior Shopify specialists, not an account manager relaying to an offshore queue.

Shopify specialists

We build, optimize, and scale on Shopify and Shopify Plus every day — from technical catalogs to conversion and retention.

Maine-built, growth-obsessed

Headquartered in Portland, Maine, we partner with brands across the U.S. and measure our work in revenue, retention, and ROAS.

What clients say

They were really good at communicating.

Tandem Coffee

Coffee & beverage · Shopify

“We looked forward to talking and laughing with them.”

Ragged Coast Chocolates

16% online · 39% in-store sales increase

Award-winning ecommerce work

First Pier is recognized by Clutch across Shopify, ecommerce development, design, and performance marketing — nationally and here in Maine.

Clutch Top SEO Company in Maine 2026 award badge
Clutch Top Digital Marketing Company for Ecommerce in Maine award badge
Clutch Top Web Design Company in Maine 2026 award badge
Clutch Top Shopify Company in Portland 2026 award badge
Clutch Top Full Service Digital Company in Portland 2026 award badge
Clutch Top Shopify Company in the United States 2026 award badge
Clutch Top E-Commerce Developers in the United States 2026 award badge
Clutch Top Ecommerce Marketing Agency in the United States 2026 award badge
Clutch 1000 2025 award badge
Clutch Champion Spring 2024 award badge
Clutch Global Fall 2024 award badge
Clutch Top Shopify Company 2026 award badge

Frequently Asked Questions

Do you work with coffee, beverage, or specialty-food brands specifically?
A bright blue hand drawn plus sign

Yes — this is award-winning territory for us. First Pier was named a national Clutch Top Food & Beverage Ecommerce Developer, and we drove a 9x peak ROAS on paid for specialty roaster Ragged Coast Chocolate.

How do you handle subscriptions and repeat orders?
A bright blue hand drawn plus sign

Subscription and reorder UX is central to how we build for this category — since coffee and beverage brands earn most of their value from customers who come back weekly or monthly, not from one-off purchases.

Our products are perishable and sensitive to shipping conditions — can you help?
A bright blue hand drawn plus sign

Yes. We build the fulfillment logic, packaging rules, and shipping strategy that account for freshness windows, so perishable goods arrive on time and in the condition customers expect.

We sell both wholesale and direct-to-consumer — can one store handle both?
A bright blue hand drawn plus sign

Yes. We build pricing and checkout flows that let cafés, retail accounts, and direct customers each get the right experience without fragmenting your catalog into separate systems.

How do you help people try our product for the first time?
A bright blue hand drawn plus sign

We build sampling, bundle, and gifting offers that lower the barrier to that first order — since taste sells, but only once someone's actually tried it.

Book your free growth audit

Tell us where you want to grow. A senior First Pier strategist will review your store and send back a prioritized, no-obligation growth plan.

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