How Maine Lobster Now Scaled Sales 69% with Shopify

Introduction

Maine Lobster Now sells live, gourmet Maine lobsters direct to doors across North America. At launch, founder Julian Klenda ran orders through notes folders, typing addresses into UPS by hand. They tried a Zen Cart-Magento system with a custom calendar but ended up spending over $1 million on development, suffering slow checkout pages, security patches, and unsupported apps. When fraud hit big orders, the team spent hours calling customers to confirm payments.

The Challenge

A perishable product demands precise delivery timing and transparent shipping costs. Weekend and holiday surcharges had to appear seamlessly in checkout. But Magento’s plugin ecosystem was patchy—apps were one-time purchases and often became unsupported. Each feature change required a developer sprint, stretching budgets and timelines. Meanwhile, chargebacks climbed as fraud detection lagged, costing time and customer trust.

The Shopify Solution

Switching to Shopify delivered a built-in, fast checkout and a flexible delivery date calendar without a single line of custom checkout code. Shop Pay’s fraud filters blocked bad transactions automatically. The Shopify App Store gave access to Klaviyo for segmented email and SMS marketing, all manageable in one dashboard. Teams could install quality apps in seconds, no developer required.

Results

• Overall conversion rose 69%, mobile conversion soared 97%
• Chargebacks due to fraud dropped 93%—from 0.25% to 0.025% of transactions
• Store build cost fell by roughly 90% compared to Magento

Conclusion

By moving from a heavyweight, developer-dependent platform to Shopify’s unified solution, Maine Lobster Now cut build time, slashed fraud, and boosted sales. The team now spends less time wrestling with integrations and more time delighting big-ticket customers, planning advanced shipping options, and exploring subscription models—all on one stable platform.