Case Study: How Simmons Bedding Went Direct-To-Customer On Shopify Plus

Simmons Bedding has been one of the leading mattress companies for over 150 years. Since its inception, the brand has stood for uncompromising American-assembled quality and innovation. 

They pride themselves on being CERTIPUR-US CERTIFIED®, meaning they sell mattresses without harsh toxic chemicals that are sometimes present in foam, such as Formaldehyde and Mercury. Simmons also ensures a fairly priced place to sleep without sacrificing quality. 

All of this to say, Simmons was purely selling to retailers and never direct-to-customer. It was time for that to change, so they came to Avex. 

Simmons New Needs

Even with the century-and-a-half long success of their business, Simmons knew there was more to come for the company. A new DTC model would enhance their brand like never before.

The team at Serta Simmons Bedding needed a new e-commerce solution. Their site had to be easy to manage, optimized for conversions, and fast to market. Another aspect of their online presence was that it be integrated with their legacy ERP system.

Creating Their Shopify Plus Store

Avex worked closely with the Simmons team on e-commerce strategy, user experience and platform, SaaS discovery, and technology planning with a focus on ERP integration. 

Together, we decided that Shopify Plus would be the perfect e-commerce platform to take the brand direct-to-consumer without the need for a bloated and overly complex enterprise commerce solution.

Our strategists helped Simmons plan customer journeys, integrate SaaS products such as Yotpo, Blueshift, and OneTrust, and design and develop a seamless user experience on Shopify Plus. 

Technological Challenges

Avex created a custom middleware solution to connect their legacy ERP system OHM to the new Shopify Plus backend. Our solution engineers worked closely with Simmons’s IT team to build, deploy, and support their ERP integrations.

Connecting the enterprise level ERP to Shopify to send orders for processing ensured orders flowed through their own existing legacy ERP system without any description to order processing.  

Additionally, the client requested we use a tool called Cleo to set up the connection on their site, making it so we had to map out the JSON fields explicitly. With our and the client’s expertise, we were able to integrate as Simmons wanted!

Final Results

The Avex team was able to bring Simmons to DTC in less than 4 months. In terms of the OHM - ERP integration, Simmons had immediate sales out of the gate, and they continue to grow their DTC channel. 

Our UX designers and e-commerce strategists planned out the customer journey, creating an initiative and seamless shopping experience. A strong emphasis was put on providing valuable information to the customer, supporting their buying decisions, and optimizing the PDP for conversions. 

The brand’s primary demographic was shopping on mobile, so we took a mobile-first approach to design the user experience. They saw lightning-fast page speed, all built on the Shopify Plus platform.

Avex launched the new DTC Simmons website with speed-to-market and integrations to support their business requirements as they continue to grow.