El Gato Tuerto - Liquor Store

El Gato Tuerto is an online liquor store project aiming to provide a seamless eCommerce experience for customers seeking a wide selection of spirits. From the very beginning, the development process was guided by continuous stakeholder collaboration, weekly milestone reviews, and a clear focus on user-centric design.

I started by meeting with the store’s manager and the owner to outline the high-level requirements: product categorization, an intuitive browsing interface, and integration with a delivery service. We agreed on an initial prototype that served more as an online menu rather than a full shopping cart experience. However, as the project took shape and weekly demos showcased the system’s potential, both the manager and the owner began to see the advantages of a complete checkout process. This meant customers could place orders directly, transforming the site from a simple product display into a fully functional eCommerce platform.

Midway through development, new feedback from the owner significantly shifted our plans for the Home and Catalog pages. Initially, I had arranged these sections to emphasize product images and brief descriptions, following a minimalistic design. However, the owner desired a more dynamic, content-rich layout to highlight ongoing deals and emphasize certain premium products. Consequently, I rebuilt much of the Catalog interface to accommodate additional filtering options, eye-catching banners, and bold promotional elements on the homepage. This iteration demanded thorough refactoring of the UI but ultimately aligned the website more closely with the owner’s vision.

Another major addition was the checkout section. Once the realization set in that El Gato Tuerto should handle actual online orders, I integrated a complete checkout workflow—cart, address details, payment steps, and order confirmation emails. This not only required redesigning the overall user flow (from browsing to purchase) but also balancing constraints like inventory management and real-time pricing updates for certain high-demand items. We settled on a staging environment to test each checkout feature before bringing it fully into production, ensuring the transition from a menu-like structure to a robust eCommerce system went smoothly.

In parallel with these interface changes, the deployment strategy combined Vercel for hosting the front-end React application and GoDaddy for domain registration. Vercel’s serverless architecture enabled quick rollouts of new front-end releases, while GoDaddy provided a straightforward way to point the custom domain to Vercel’s infrastructure. This structure offered minimal downtime, a rapid feedback loop, and an easily maintainable environment that could adapt to evolving requirements.

As the site went live, we initiated a multi-pronged marketing strategy to build visibility. First, we focused on SEO, optimizing page titles, meta descriptions, and relevant keywords around popular liquor brands and promotions. Over time, these efforts help improve ranking on search engines, ensuring interested customers can find El Gato Tuerto quickly. Additionally, the store’s staff started handing out simple promo cards during in-person visits, each featuring a link and QR code to the eCommerce site. This blend of digital and physical marketing not only boosted online traffic but also bridged the gap between traditional in-store shopping and modern online convenience.

By fostering continuous communication with the owner and manager, embracing design flexibility mid-project, and deploying iterative releases every week, El Gato Tuerto progressed from a concept to a professional, engaging eCommerce platform. Looking ahead, ongoing adjustments to the catalog, checkout interface, and marketing campaigns will drive growth and ensure that El Gato Tuerto maintains its competitive edge in the liquor retail market.