ViCAFE now gives each of their 19 Espresso Bars a dedicated Shopify page where customers can check opening hours, get to know the neighborhood, and shop for the coffee they tasted at the window. Espresso Bar managers update their information in Google, and the website automatically reflects those changes overnight.
The Swiss specialty coffee roaster is known for serving coffee on-the-go through neighborhood windows. Their beans are roasted in Zurich, and their Espresso Bars bring the brand into communities across Zurich, Basel, Eglisau, and Lausanne. A cup at the window gives someone a way to try ViCAFE before buying a bag of beans for home.
ViCAFE wanted to make it easier for customers to enjoy their favorite coffee at home. After moving to Shopify with Enkomion in 2024, the team simplified coffee purchases and subscriptions. The team then redesigned its location pages to showcase each Espresso Bar’s neighborhood character and help customers find nearby locations and shop for their favorite coffee online.
With Shopify, ViCAFE has:
- 19 individual espresso-bar pages with opening hours refreshed automatically each night
- 31% more location-page users in August and September 2026 than in June and July
- 20% more location-related search terms ranking at the end of September 2026 than at the end of June
- More than doubled subscription revenue since moving to Shopify, with 44% growth in the first year and over 50% projected growth in the second year
The challenge
Bringing ViCAFE’s coffee-window experience online
ViCAFE’s Espresso Bars are designed to serve exceptional coffee quickly without compromising on quality. The team wanted to make it just as easy for customers to buy coffee beans and set up recurring deliveries online.
Oliver Pretorius, an ecommerce growth consultant at ViCAFE, used Shopify in other businesses. When he began helping ViCAFE grow their direct-to-consumer business, he recommended migrating to Shopify. The previous WordPress site struggled with slow performance, broken links, and ongoing server maintenance. Shopify offered a more reliable platform and a better customer experience.
We consider every detail at the Espresso Bar window, from where the coffee machine sits, to how we serve each guest. With Shopify and Enkomion, we could bring that same user experience to buying coffee online for the company.
Customers also had to choose between a one-time purchase and a subscription before selecting their coffee. Their bestseller Hausmischung ( “House Blend”) had separate product pages for a one-time purchase and a subscription. A shopper browsing the one-time product could overlook the option for recurring deliveries.
Giving a growing bar network room to tell its story
The move to Shopify established a new ecommerce foundation, but the Espresso Bars initially remained together on one grid-based page.
As ViCAFE expanded to Lausanne, the team needed a way to support another region and language while showcasing each Espresso Bar’s unique neighborhood and community.
Previously, updating opening hours required two updates. Shop anagers updated the Google Business Profile, and the marketing team manually entered the same information on the website. This duplicated effort and created inconsistencies. ViCAFE wanted to remove that repeated work while keeping the familiar process their bar managers already used.
The solution
Simplifying coffee purchases with an experienced partner
ViCAFE connected with Enkomion through a recommendation from California- and Japan-based Verve Coffee Roasters.
Daniel Paul, who runs Enkomion, a Shopify consultancy with a strong background in working with multi-location café operators, brought the technical precision and API experience that ViCAFE needed. Enkomion built the Shopify storefront and worked with ViCAFE’s existing software partner to integrate its enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, which continued to manage products, customer management and order fulfillment.
ViCAFE launched its Shopify storefront in December 2024, allowing customers to choose between a one-time purchase and a subscription on the same product page, with Stay AI supporting subscriptions. Customers could now see the subscription option while browsing their favorite coffee, making it easier to sign up for recurring deliveries.
The partnership with Enkomion continued after launch through conversion improvements and new pages. The next project could use Shopify’s foundation and the working relationship both companies had already established.
Updating location pages from the workflow managers already use
The location project began with opening hours. Moving 19 Shop Managers into Shopify for that single task would have added another process. Instead, Enkomion connected the Google Maps information that Shop Managers already maintained to the website, then extended the connection to photos, reviews, and amenities.
Shopify metaobjects give each Espresso Bar and region a structured record and its own storefront page. ViCAFE’s marketing team controls the descriptions, brand photography, and other editorial details in Shopify. A nightly job running on GitHub Actions retrieves Google Places data and updates the automatic fields through the Shopify Admin GraphQL API. Google and GitHub remain part of the setup, while Shopify publishes the location experience.
Changes to opening hours in Google automatically appear on the website after the next nightly refresh, eliminating the need for manual updates. Marketing keeps control of how each bar is presented, and managers continue maintaining local information. Shopify Translate & Adapt supports the German and French versions alongside the English pages.
Previously we had to manually update Espresso Bar hours on the website, and now it automatically updates when changes are made in Google My Business which saves us some meaningful time.
Helping customers choose a neighborhood bar and its coffee
The new location pages went live in June 2026. Customers visiting the website through a Espresso Bar’s Google Business Profile now land directly on that bar’s dedicated page instead of having to search through the full list of locations. The location hub lets visitors search by name or region and use maps and distance information to find nearby Espresso Bars.
Enkomion customized the map to show ViCAFE’s locations across Switzerland and help customers find nearby espresso bars. Someone looking for coffee in Zurich needs to compare nearby bars—not navigate a map of the world. Building the experience on Shopify gave the team control over that presentation.
Someone looking for a coffee in Zurich needs to know which coffee shop is a few hundred meters away. Building the pages on Shopify let us tailor the maps, distances, and local information to that experience.
Each destination also gives customers a sense of the place before they arrive. Neighborhood descriptions and local landmarks sit alongside images from ViCAFE’s in-house photographer. Regularly updated customer images and selected Google reviews keep the page fresh and add another view of the experience, showing the Espresso Bars through the lens of people who visit them.
Every Espresso Bar belongs to a different area and has its own community. Now each one has a page that shows its character, with our photography alongside pictures and reviews from the people who enjoy ViCAFE.
The pages also help turn Espresso Bbar visits into online purchases. ViCAFE serves its Hausmischung on one grinder and rotates a seasonal coffee on another. Each shop
‘s page features the coffees currently being served, with links to purchase the beans online. Customers can find a coffee they enjoyed at the window, buy it for home, or sign up for a subscription.
The results
Growing local discovery and repeat coffee purchases
The location pages attracted 31% more users in August and September 2026 than in June and July. ViCAFE also saw a 20% increase in the number of location-related search terms it ranked for between June 30 and September 30, 2026.
Organic search is ViCAFE’s largest traffic source, followed by a strong direct audience, and the brand does not use paid media. The Espresso Bar hub is one of ViCAFE’s most popular website pages. The team monitors location-page traffic, overall organic traffic, and revenue to understand how customers engage. The improved location pages support that journey, while removing the recurring handoff to marketing for website-hours updates.
In their first full year on Shopify, ViCAFE grew subscription revenue by 44% in 2025 compared with 2024. In 2026, the team is on track for more than 50% growth in subscription revenue compared with 2025. Offering one-time purchases and subscriptions on the same product page makes it easier for customers to choose recurring deliveries.
On Shopify, customers can buy their coffee once or subscribe from the same product page. Our subscription revenue grew 44% year over year in 2025, and we’re on track for more than 50% year-over-year growth in 2026.
Making local information useful for AI discovery
The same location records also provide structured data that search engines and AI tools can read. Hours, coordinates, and amenities have a consistent format behind each page, alongside the customer-facing content. Some amenities appear as icons, while others only appear in the structured data.
ViCAFE estimates that traffic from AI tools amounts to about 10% of their organic-search traffic volume, and that traffic is growing.
The team is also working to improve ViCAFE’s visibility in AI-powered search.. Accurate, detailed location information helps ViCAFE improve its AI search visibility while also supporting customers who find the brand through Google or visit the website directly.
Building on the relationship that starts at the window
ViCAFE plans to continue improving the connection between its Espresso Bars and online shop while strengthening relationships with its existing customers.
Personal advice remains part of that experience. The subscription page invites customers who are unsure which coffee to choose to phone the team, with a promise that a person will answer. Oliver insisted on making personal support part of the online experience, and customers have taken advantage of the offer. As ViCAFE makes coffee easier to find and order through Shopify, the team remains available to help.
A cup of coffee at the window is how many people first get to know ViCAFE. We want to make it just as easy for them to enjoy the same experience at home and keep coming back, whether they visit an Espresso Bar or shop online.