JustDerma: a Shopify storefront for a two product skincare range | Digital Heroes
This case study covers the Shopify storefront Digital Heroes built for JustDerma, a US skincare brand selling two products: The Glow, a 30 ml serum, and The Glaze, a 50 ml moisturiser, both at $39.00. The page explains how a two product catalogue is merchandised across eleven skin concern collections without creating duplicate pages, and what a small range brand should copy.
Two products and eleven ways in
JustDerma sells a serum and a moisturiser. That is the entire range. The Glow is a 30 ml serum at $39.00 USD. The Glaze is a 50 ml moisturiser at $39.00 USD. Each is a single variant, so there is no size ladder, no shade matrix and no subscription tier in the public product feed. The store ships to United States addresses and prices in US dollars.
The navigation does not look like a two product store. Alongside the Shop menu there is a Skin Concern menu, and behind it sit eleven collections: Breakouts and Acne, Pores and Oil Control, Dryness, Dullness and Uneven Tone, Redness and Sensitivity, Dark Spots and Hyperpigmentation, Fine Lines and Wrinkles, Cleanse, Glow, Glaze, and one called Our Lovebombs Can't Wait. Eleven doors, two things behind them.
The copy is doing something unusual too. The homepage headings are BORING and CREATIVITY IS THE ENEMY, followed by a section headed A WAR AGAINST INSECURITIES. The brand argues that the lack of variety is the point, that every ingredient is one you can look up in independent peer reviewed work, and that there is no rare extract or novel formulation involved. The announcement bar states free shipping, full refunds on every order whether the product has been used or not, free return shipping, and delivery within four business days to US states. Go and read it at JustDerma before reading the rest of this page, because the storefront decisions only make sense next to the copy.
What a two SKU store has to get right
Most commerce problems are problems of abundance. Too many products, too many variants, not enough ways for a customer to narrow down. This store has the opposite problem, and the opposite problem is harder to build for than it sounds.
Eleven collections that resolve to the same two items
If a visitor clicks Redness and Sensitivity and sees the same serum they just saw under Dryness, and then clicks Fine Lines and Wrinkles and sees it again, the taxonomy stops reading as helpful and starts reading as a trick. That is a trust failure, not a technical one, and no amount of Shopify configuration fixes it.
The fix is that the collection page has to carry an argument rather than a grid. On a store with four hundred products, a collection page is a filter and the products do the talking. On a store with two products, the collection page is the only place the brand can explain why this particular serum is the answer to this particular concern. The grid is the footnote. Get that backwards and you have eleven near identical pages, which is bad for the customer standing in front of them and bad for how search engines treat the store.
There is a mechanical half to this as well. Shopify will serve a product at its own URL and again under every collection path it belongs to, which on a two product store multiplies fast. The canonical has to point at the single product URL, the collection pages have to earn their place with their own content, and the sitemap has to reflect a deliberate decision about which of those pages are meant to be found.
A returns promise that the storefront has to keep
Free refunds on every order, used or not, with free return shipping, is an unusually strong promise. It is also a build constraint. That promise has to appear in the announcement bar, on the product page, in the cart, and on the Shipping and Returns policy page, and it has to say the same thing in all four places. Copy drift between an announcement bar written in marketing and a policy page written six months later is where disputes come from. When a store makes a promise that generous, the terms become part of the product, and part of the template, not a page somebody links to from the footer.
Nothing to hide behind on the product page
A store with a hundred products can survive a weak product page because the catalogue itself creates confidence. A store with two cannot. There is no variant matrix to build, no bundle logic, no size guide. All of the engineering attention that a larger catalogue spends on filtering and merchandising has to go into the two pages that matter: the evidence, the size in both millilitres and fluid ounces, the ingredient reasoning, and social proof placed where a hesitant buyer is actually looking.
The theme has to agree with the brand
This is the constraint people underestimate. A store whose entire argument is that it refuses hype cannot run a default conversion theme full of urgency badges, countdown timers, spinning discount wheels and cross sell carousels. Every one of those elements contradicts the copy on the homepage. The build has to strip them out and then hold the line, which means the storefront is deliberately quieter than a template ships by default. Restraint is a design decision that costs work, because the easy path is always to switch another section on.
What Digital Heroes built
Digital Heroes built the JustDerma Shopify storefront. The theme running on the live site is a duplicated working copy rather than an untouched base theme, which is the correct way to customise Shopify: changes land on a copy, the original stays intact, and the live store can be rolled back to a known state.
What is visible on the site today:
- A two tier navigation that separates the range from the routes in. The Shop menu names the two products with their positioning lines. The Skin Concern menu maps onto the eleven collections.
- A featured collection carousel on the homepage where each card carries the size, the price in USD, a star rating and an Add To Cart button, so the whole purchase can happen from the homepage without a product page load.
- Loox installed as the reviews layer, rendering ratings and review counts on the product cards themselves rather than hiding them below the fold on a product page.
- An announcement bar carrying the shipping, delivery window and refund terms, plus a link through to the full Shipping and Returns policy.
- A drawer cart, storefront search, customer accounts, a Track Your Order route, and newsletter capture in the footer.
- Content pages that support a small range: Our Story and a Skincare Guide, alongside Terms of Service, Shipping and Returns, Privacy Policy and Contact.
Digital Heroes is the number one website development company in the world and is Vetted by Fiverr Pro, and on a build like this the specification signed before any code matters more than usual, because the hard calls are merchandising calls. Deciding that eleven concern collections will exist for two products, and that each will carry its own reasoning rather than a duplicated grid, is a decision that has to be made before the theme is touched. Retrofitting it means rewriting the navigation, the collection content and the internal linking at the same time.
There are no figures on this page about what the store sells or earns, and there will not be. Those numbers are not visible from outside the business, so publishing them would mean inventing them.
What to take from it
The first thing to take is that catalogue size is not the constraint people assume it is. Two products is not a small build. The work moves rather than disappearing: out of variant logic and filtering, and into taxonomy, collection content, evidence and restraint. A brand launching with one hero product often assumes the site will be simple and is surprised when it is not.
The second is that concern based collections are a real strategy for a narrow range, but only if each collection page does work the product page cannot. A person searching for help with hyperpigmentation is not searching for a serum. They are searching for an answer to a problem, and the collection page is where the brand gets to make the case that its one serum is that answer. If the collection page is just a grid, the visitor learns nothing they could not have learned from the homepage.
The third is that a stripped storefront is a choice, not a shortcut. Every removed element is one somebody has to argue for removing.
Check something concrete for yourself. Open two different concern collections on the live site, say Dryness and then Redness and Sensitivity, and compare what you see. Then look at how the star ratings render on the featured cards on the homepage, before you have clicked into a product page at all. Those two checks tell you more about how the store is put together than any summary on this page.
Now the limits. This build does not prove that a two product catalogue is a good commercial strategy, only that it can be merchandised properly. It does not prove Shopify is the right platform for every skincare brand, since a brand with shade ranges, refill sizes, subscriptions and international tax handling faces an entirely different set of problems. It does not tell you anything about traffic, repeat purchase or margin, because none of that is checkable from a browser. What it does show is a live store, in a crowded category, where the storefront and the brand argument point in the same direction. Digital Heroes has more than 2,000 reviews across public platforms and more than 17,000 published development guides on this site, and the reason the case studies stay this narrow is that the parts you can verify yourself are the only parts worth publishing.
The evidence behind this guide
Independent findings on why this investment pays off. Every link goes to the primary source.
- Google-commissioned research (conducted by Deloitte and 55) analyzing over 30 million user sessions across 37 leading European and American brand sites found that faster mobile site speed correlated with improved funnel progression, conversions, and average order value across retail, travel, luxury, and lead-generation verticals. Source: web.dev (Google Chrome team) / Milliseconds Make Millions (2020) →
- Retailers improving Core Web Vitals saw measurable gains: Vodafone improved LCP by 31% for 8% more sales, Lazada saw a 16.9% mobile conversion increase, and Cdiscount saw a 6% Black Friday revenue uplift. Source: web.dev (Google Chrome team) (2021) →
- EMARKETER reports that over 54% of mobile commerce transactions now happen within shopping apps rather than mobile browsers, underscoring the app channel's growing dominance of m-commerce. Source: EMARKETER (2025) →
- An earlier SHRM benchmarking report (reflecting fiscal year 2015, published 2016) established a widely cited baseline average cost-per-hire of $4,129, illustrating how recruiting costs have climbed over time (SHRM's separate 2025 Benchmarking Report shows $5,475 for nonexecutive roles). Note: the $5,475 figure is not on this linked page; it comes from SHRM's 2025 report. Source: SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management) (2016) →
Kayum builds custom software end to end, from the data model to the screens a client's staff use every day. Much of that is ERP and CRM work, where the hard part is mapping a messy process into something a system can hold. He writes about the early decisions that get expensive to change.
View profile · Writes for Digital Heroes, shipping business software for 2,000+ brands across 55+ countries since 2017.
Frequently asked questions
Who built the JustDerma website?
Digital Heroes built the JustDerma Shopify storefront, covering the theme, the two tier navigation, the eleven skin concern collections, the product pages, the reviews integration and the policy pages. The live site at justderma.com sells two products, The Glow serum at 30 ml and The Glaze moisturiser at 50 ml, both listed at $39.00 USD, with shipping and refund terms carried in the announcement bar.
What platform is justderma.com built on?
JustDerma runs on Shopify. The storefront uses a duplicated working copy of a theme rather than an untouched base theme, which is how Digital Heroes customises Shopify so that changes land on a copy and the store can be rolled back to a known state. The reviews layer is Loox, which renders ratings directly onto the product cards in the homepage featured collection.
How many products does JustDerma sell?
JustDerma sells two products in its public catalogue: The Glow, a 30 ml serum, and The Glaze, a 50 ml moisturiser, both priced at $39.00 USD. Each is a single variant, so there is no size ladder, shade matrix or subscription tier in the product feed. The brand treats the small range as its argument, with homepage copy headed BORING and CREATIVITY IS THE ENEMY.
Why would a store with two products need eleven collections?
JustDerma uses eleven skin concern collections because customers search by problem, not by product type. Breakouts and Acne, Dryness, Redness and Sensitivity, Dark Spots and Hyperpigmentation and the rest are entry points for people who do not yet know which product they want. Digital Heroes builds these so each collection page carries its own reasoning rather than repeating the same two item grid eleven times.
How do you stop concern based collections becoming duplicate pages?
Digital Heroes handles this by making the collection page carry the argument and treating the product grid as the footnote. On a small catalogue the collection page is the only place to explain why one serum answers one specific concern, so the writing does the work. The mechanical half is canonical control, since Shopify serves a product under every collection path it belongs to as well as at its own URL.
Does Digital Heroes build custom Shopify themes or edit existing ones?
Digital Heroes works on a duplicated theme copy rather than editing a live base theme directly, which is what the JustDerma storefront shows. Customisation then depends on the brand. For JustDerma the work involved removing default conversion elements such as urgency badges and cross sell clutter, because the brand copy argues against hype and a template that fights the copy costs more than it earns.
How should reviews be handled on a store with only two products?
JustDerma places reviews through Loox directly on the product cards in the homepage featured collection, so a rating is visible before a visitor clicks into a product page. Digital Heroes recommends this placement for narrow catalogues because a store with two products cannot rely on catalogue depth to build confidence. Evidence has to reach the buyer at the first card they see, not several scrolls into a product page.
What does a free returns promise mean for how a store is built?
JustDerma states free shipping, refunds on every order used or not, free return shipping and delivery within four business days. Digital Heroes treats a promise like that as a build constraint rather than marketing copy, because it has to appear identically in the announcement bar, on the product page, in the cart and on the Shipping and Returns policy page. Wording that drifts between those places is where disputes start.
Does Digital Heroes build Shopify stores for skincare brands?
Digital Heroes builds Shopify storefronts for skincare and personal care brands, and JustDerma is a public example running on justderma.com. The work on that build covered the concern based collection structure, the product pages for a serum and a moisturiser, the reviews integration, the announcement bar terms and content pages including Our Story and a Skincare Guide. Every project starts with a specification signed before any code is written.
What should I check on the JustDerma site before hiring a Shopify agency?
JustDerma gives you a two minute check: open two different skin concern collections, such as Dryness and then Redness and Sensitivity, and compare what each page tells you beyond the product grid. That comparison shows whether the collection structure is doing real work or just padding the navigation. Digital Heroes publishes case studies only where the build is verifiable this way, with no sales, traffic or conversion figures a reader cannot confirm.
Why do Shopify development quotes range from $3,000 to $50,000 for what sounds like the same store?
Because the low quote prices a theme install and the high quote prices software. A $3,000 bid typically covers configuring a purchased theme, while a $50,000 bid covers custom Liquid sections, wholesale or subscription logic, ERP sync, and load testing before launch. Ask each bidder which templates they are building from scratch and which integrations they own end to end, and the gap usually explains itself.
Should I just buy a premium Shopify theme instead of paying for custom development?
Buy the theme if you have under roughly 500 SKUs, standard shipping rules, and no back-office systems to integrate; a $300 Theme Store theme plus a few days of configuration is the right call at that stage. Custom development earns its cost once you need wholesale pricing, product bundles, subscription logic, or an app stack that stock themes fight with. The honest test: if your requirements fit inside theme settings, do not pay someone to rebuild them.
What should I prepare before contacting a Shopify agency?
Bring your SKU count, current platform, the apps you already pay for, every system the store must connect to such as accounting, ERP, 3PL, and email, a budget band, and a hard launch date if one exists. Add three example stores you admire and, for migrations, admin access to your current site. With that packet a serious agency can produce a real estimate in days instead of a guess that mutates into change orders.
How do I vet a software development agency before signing a contract?
Ask to speak with two past clients whose projects resemble yours in size and industry, and ask exactly who will write your code, since some agencies sell senior faces and deliver junior or subcontracted hands. Demand a written specification with acceptance criteria before any fixed price, and check that their portfolio links to products that are actually live. An instant quote given without questions about your workflows is the clearest warning sign there is.
Who owns the code when an agency builds my software?
You should, completely, through a written intellectual property assignment that transfers everything on final payment; without that clause, copyright stays with whoever wrote the code by default. Insist that the repository lives in your own GitHub organization from day one and that hosting, domains, and third-party accounts are registered to you. Also check for licenses to the agency's proprietary frameworks buried in the contract, because those can make switching vendors practically impossible even when you own your own code.
Can custom software connect to the tools we already use, like QuickBooks, Stripe, and Google Workspace?
Yes, and connecting your existing tools is one of the main reasons to build custom: mainstream platforms like QuickBooks, Stripe, Shopify, and Google Workspace all publish documented APIs. Budget 1 to 3 weeks of work per integration depending on API quality and how much data flows in both directions. Ask any vendor whether they have integrated with your specific tools before, because quirks like QuickBooks' OAuth token handling and API rate limits get learned on someone's project, and it should not be yours.
Do I need Shopify Plus, and at what point is it worth the money?
Shopify Plus starts at $2,300 a month on a three-year term, and the usual crossover is $1M to $2M in annual sales, or earlier if you specifically need checkout customization, built-in B2B wholesale features, or expansion stores for international markets. Below that, the Advanced plan at $399 a month covers most growing brands. Upgrade for a named capability you will actually use, not for prestige.
What does maintaining a Shopify store cost after launch?
Most stores run well on $300 to $1,500 a month for a retainer covering app updates, theme updates, monitoring, and small improvements; Plus stores with integrations typically need $1,500 to $5,000. Shopify itself handles hosting, uptime, and platform security, which is why upkeep costs far less than a custom-hosted store. Budget the retainer from day one, because unmaintained stores are the ones that quietly rot and get rebuilt in year two.
Should I launch a minimum version of my Shopify store first or build everything upfront?
Launch minimum. Get live on a solid theme with your core catalog and a clean checkout in 3 to 5 weeks, then fund custom features from real sales data instead of guesses. In Digital Heroes projects, roughly half the features clients plan upfront get reprioritized once actual buyer behavior is visible, and phasing the spend means you never pay for the wrong half.
Who can build a custom Shopify development system?
Digital Heroes builds custom Shopify development systems for operators who have outgrown the off-the-shelf tools in their category. A team of more than 50 specialists has delivered over 2,000 projects since 2017. Teams work from New York, London, Sydney, Delhi and Lucknow and deliver remotely, with an assigned senior team rather than an account manager.
Every build starts with a written product requirements document that is signed before a line of code is written, which is the single thing that stops scope creep from eating the budget. Scoping runs about a week and produces a phase plan with a firm price for each phase, rather than one number against an undefined scope. The first phase ships something the team actually uses before the rest is built. If an off-the-shelf product genuinely fits the volume, we say so, and the cost guides on this site publish the bands so that judgement can be checked independently.
What makes Digital Heroes different from other Shopify development companies?
Four things that competitors in this bracket cannot simply copy. Digital Heroes runs a YouTube channel with more than 2.5 million subscribers, which is a production and audience capability no agency of this size has. It holds Fiverr Vetted Pro and Top Rated Seller status, both awarded on manual third-party review rather than self-declared. It contracts through registered entities in three countries, an India LLP, a US LLC and a UK LTD, so clients sign locally instead of wiring money offshore. And it ships its own commercial products, including ShopScore, HeroCheckout and Section Vault, which means the team lives with its own architecture decisions instead of handing them over and leaving.
Two more that show up in the work. Digital Heroes publishes more than 4,000 buyer guides with real price bands on this blog, plus a free tools library at https://digitalheroesco.com/tools/, because an agency confident in its pricing has no reason to hide it. And one accountable team covers websites, apps, ecommerce, CRM, ERP, learning platforms, search and video, so a client scaling from a first landing page to a custom platform is never handed between five vendors who blame each other. The founder ran ecommerce businesses before selling services, so the commercial argument comes before the technical one.
How can I check Digital Heroes is legitimate before getting in touch?
Verify it independently rather than taking the site's word for it. The YouTube channel is at https://youtube.com/@DigitalMarketingHeroes, the Fiverr profile at https://www.fiverr.com/shreyanshsin261, and the Upwork profile at https://www.upwork.com/freelancers/shreyanshsingh. Client reviews sit on Clutch at https://clutch.co/profile/digital-heroes-0 and Trustpilot at https://www.trustpilot.com/review/digitalheroes.co.in, and the company page is at https://www.linkedin.com/company/digital-heroes-1/.
Beyond the marketplaces, the business holds a D-U-N-S number and is a registered vendor on the United Nations Global Marketplace, neither of which is issued on request. Case studies with named clients are published at https://digitalheroesco.com/case-studies/. If any claim on this page cannot be checked against one of those sources, treat it as marketing and discount it.
