On lucky Friday 13th, 2010 the Cat’s Meow Personalized Gifts new homepage and e-commerce website went live.  Located in Des Peres, MO, Cat’s Meow, owner Catherine Bennett started the business in 1996 selling monogrammed and embroidered gifts from her home.  Since then the business has grown and expanded into the Des Peres storefront it now occupies opening its doors in 2008 and doubling in space less than a year later.  This year we have been given the exciting opportunity of helping them expand into a fully functional online store.

Designed and developed by our team the website has incorporated countless special features and added functionality which will only expand in the future.  The design was inspired by their retail space incorporating numerous elements from the color palate of many of their products to the black and white awning present .   The front end of the site is built on a Joomla! content management system which is linked to one of the most robust cart systems available, Magento.  The text on the website is overlaid with sIFR to allow the use of the Murray Hill font face.

The level of product personalization presented a challenge within the Magento cart as the functionality did not exist out of the box to create custom options which were dependent of one another however we addressed this with a custom option component.  We added Facebook share functionality to allow visitors to “Like” products as well.  On the back end the online shopping cart synchronizes seamlessly with the in-store inventory management and accounting software to simplify management.  We are still looking towards further customization and to address any bugs that may pop up but we are very happy with what we’ve created.  It’s no easy task to integrate everything required to expand a retail store into cyberspace while keeping everything under control and to put a completely custom design on top of that is icing on the cake.

Cat’s Meow Embroidery and Gifts has built a healthy niche for itself in the St. Louis Area with it’s wide selection of personalized products. As business has expanded so have their needs.  To satisfy demands Matchbox will be creating an entirely new web presence for the Cat’s Meow. We will deliver a completely new design, Joomla! framework and plenty of new features to enhance customer experiences while allowing for easy updates. Content is currently being developed and design comps are in the works and we’re slatted for a launch early this spring!

Student-Athlete Advantage

On 9-9-09 Student-Athlete Advantage opened its doors to new members.  Rick Dodd and Martin Thompson came to us with the desire to create a website dedicated to offering personal advisory and life coaching services focused on guiding elite student-athletes toward their academic, athletic & life goals.  Currently serving elite student-athlete hockey players, SAA draws on Rick and Martin’s extensive backgrounds in academics and athletics.  To help make their dream a reality Matchbox created a Joomla CMS driven website with a custom player profile component.