Eight Years With Groove: From Theme to Headless and Back to Native Shopify
Groove makes the Original Groove® pillow, an ergonomic memory foam pillow designed to keep your neck and spine aligned while you sleep. The brand now says it has helped more than 500,000 customers, and it sells through dedicated US and UK stores.
We've worked with Groove for almost eight years. In that time the store has been on three different setups: a standard Shopify theme, a fully headless build, and now native Shopify again. It's a rare chance to see each approach on the same brand, and to explain why the right answer changed.
~8 years
Working with Groove, through every platform change.
US + UK
Two native Shopify stores we run today.
CRO
Ongoing testing and optimisation on both stores.
Three Setups, One Brand
- A Shopify theme. Groove started where most brands do, on a standard storefront.
- Headless. As the range and campaigns grew, the theme couldn't keep up, so we moved to Gatsby, Sanity and Netlify on top of Shopify.
- Native again. Today both the US and UK stores run on custom native Shopify themes, and we handle both stores and their ongoing CRO.
Why we went headless
At the time, the theme was holding Groove back. Every new campaign landing page meant development work, product content wasn't structured enough to reuse, and the mobile buying journey needed attention.
The headless build solved those problems:
- Reusable campaign components so new landing pages didn't start from scratch.
- Structured content in Sanity for product specs, FAQs and reviews.
- Preview before publishing, so the team could check changes first.
- A faster storefront, with a reported 40% reduction in First Paint time.
- Mobile improvements, including a sticky add-to-cart.
Why we came back to native
Headless was the right call then. But Shopify kept improving, and over time it caught up with almost everything the headless setup had been doing for us.
Native themes now support flexible sections and blocks on every page, metafields for structured content, previews in the theme editor, and apps that simply plug in. Hosting and checkout come built in.
That meant the extra systems, and the effort of keeping them running, were no longer earning their keep. Moving back gave Groove the same flexibility with far less to maintain.
What We Work On Today
With the platform question settled, the focus is on the shopping experience itself across the US and UK stores:
- Conversion rate optimisation on both stores.
- Product pages that explain the pillow, from how it supports side and back sleepers to what's inside it.
- Proof that builds trust, like verified reviews, expert endorsements and press awards.
- Fast changes whenever the team needs them, which is what Groove's own review of working with us highlights.
What eight years taught us about platform choices
- Choose for today, not forever. Headless was right for Groove when we chose it, and native is right now.
- Every system you add has to earn its place. If the platform can do it natively, extra tools become extra cost.
- Re-check the decision as the platform changes. Shopify in 2026 is very different from Shopify in 2018.
- A long partnership makes the switch easier. Knowing the brand inside out means moving platforms without losing what works.
Thinking about headless, or about coming back from it? Our native Shopify vs headless guide walks through the tradeoffs. You can also read the Groove case study or see the Groove pillow for yourself.
