The Client
509 was born in the backcountry of the Rocky Mountains, where extreme snowmobile conditions demanded gear that could keep up. What started as a snowmobile brand has grown over two decades into a global leader in riding gear across snow, dirt, and street categories. Today, 509 offers helmets, goggles, outerwear, and accessories designed to help riders push further. Their mission is to combine innovative product design with inspiring storytelling that celebrates the adventure lifestyle.
The Challenge
By 2024, 509’s eCommerce business had outgrown its legacy Shopify theme. The storefront was functional but carried technical debt, lacked the flexibility of Shopify 2.0, and made it difficult to move quickly on new initiatives.
The company set ambitious goals: improve conversion rates, increase average order value, and prepare for future European expansion with a dedicated storefront. At the same time, Shopify’s August 2024 Checkout Extensibility mandate created a hard deadline.
Key objectives included:
- Modernize the site on Shopify Plus and upgrade to Shopify 2.0
- Enhance PDPs and merchandising to drive higher engagement
- Increase efficiency of eCommerce operations inside Shopify admin
- Improve personalization and upselling opportunities with Rebuy Smart eCommerce Personalization Engine.
- Upgrade GA4 tracking and reporting for data-driven growth
- Ensure compliance with Shopify’s mandate while creating a more seamless customer experience
All of this needed to be accomplished while keeping the current site stable and minimizing technical debt.
The Solution
Ambaum partnered with 509 through an agile engagement that balanced immediate needs and monthly maintenance with long-term scalability.
The first phase focused on upgrading 509’s current theme to a 2.0 theme that preserved 509’s strong brand identity while providing flexibility to iterate quickly. Home, collection, and product detail pages were restructured to highlight brand storytelling, improve navigation, and introduce smarter cross-sell and upsell functionality.
Rebuy played a critical role in this transformation. By embedding Rebuy into product pages, cart, and checkout, 509 gained advanced merchandising and personalization tools that with a focus on product discovery, boosting average order value, and creating new ways to surface relevant gear to riders. Paired with Shopify’s extensibility framework, the new checkout experience is both compliant and optimized for growth.
Throughout the project, Ambaum and 509 carefully evaluated each request for ROI and long-term impact. By prioritizing high-leverage initiatives, the teams ensured development hours were invested in work that would survive theme upgrades and deliver measurable growth. The result is a flexible foundation designed to scale, reduce technical debt, and empower 509’s marketing team to move faster with future campaigns and promotions.
The Result
With the new Shopify Plus 2.0 theme in place, 509 is better positioned to achieve its eCommerce goals. Conversion is up 21 percent year over year, and revenues have continued to grow since launch.
Beyond the numbers, the upgrade delivered a global-ready storefront that reflects the energy and spirit of the 509 community. The modern platform reduces the cost of managing eCommerce operations while giving the marketing team greater independence. With enhanced flexibility and tools like Rebuy driving personalization and upsells, 509 can now launch campaigns, promotions, and merchandising initiatives quickly without heavy reliance on development resources. This agility allows the brand to test ideas faster, improve customer engagement, and stay aligned with the demands of a growing global audience.
