Rearchitecting Holland and Barrett
“Like many old-school retailers out there, Holland and Barrett started their online journey by relying on out-of-the-box solutions.,” explained Paris Apostolopoulos, Engineering Manager at Holland and Barrett.
Although the previous stack served the company well as it grew its online presence, the growing shift from physical retail to e-commerce emphasized the need for the company to take full ownership of its technological architecture.
“We previously relied on huge, commercial systems that owned both the functionality and customer data. As we sought to better understand our customers and improve their shopping experience, we realized we had to move away from that. We needed a modern system that is easier to secure, more flexible, and is easier for customers to use,” Apostolopoulos said.
Rebuilding an e-commerce giant from the ground-up is no small task. It required Apostolopoulos and his team to make decisions with profound consequences for the future growth and evolution of the platform.
“Our original identity system was a simple Java-based web service that tied together the various Oracle products we used,” he said.
“We thought about re-implementing that functionality using a modern tech stack, but ultimately decided against it. We’re in the business of retail. We don’t want to re-invent the wheel. We want something that would ultimately put us in a more secure position, while proving easier to develop and maintain.”
We previously relied on huge, commercial systems that owned both the functionality and customer data. As we sought to better understand our customers and improve their shopping experience, we realized we had to move away from that. We needed a modern system that is easier to secure, more flexible, and is easier for customers to use
Paris ApostolopoulosEngineering Manager