The problem

Like many teams, as Logan Hollowell Jewelry began to grow as a luxury brand, so too did its sales force. 

With that growth, they were constantly adding more team members, which led to increasingly complex compensation structures. Eventually, leadership recognized the team needed a more flexible and transparent way to track and manage sales commissions.

‍

Gadget's AI assistant just unlocked our potential. The more we knew, the better we got and the faster we worked — it felt like this compound effect on efficiency.
— Chris Terterian

‍

They assumed the Shopify app ecosystem would have a solution. The requirements seemed straightforward: they needed to calculate commission rates based on performance goals, with the ability to make adjustments for monthly goals and performance. Yet somehow, they could not find an off-the-shelf solution.

Logan Hollowell’s Vice President of Operations, Tigran Wilson, was unfazed. He was certain there was a way to add the missing functionality, so he initiated the idea to develop a custom solution.

Tigran sat down with Chris Terterian and Vasken Mouradian, Lead Product Designer and Lead Developer, and together they laid out a long list of key requirements, which included:

• Dynamic commission calculation based on sales performance and monthly goals
• Real-time visibility for sales associates
• Manager-level permissions to assign or adjust sales attribution
• Downloadable monthly reports
• Tight integration with Shopify order and staff data

They estimated the app would take three to four months to build. However, with sales staff rapidly expanding, the problem became more urgent the longer it went unaddressed. Chris quickly realized that a working solution would become essential under a much tighter timeline.

“For me personally, this was a very high priority — getting the system in place would prevent the increasing risk of downstream bottlenecks and manual reporting nightmares,” Chris shared.

Initially, the plan was to build the app using traditional backend services paired with AI-assisted code generation. While Chris had a strong understanding of the brand and its processes, building something that interfaced properly with Shopify’s backend was a serious technical hurdle. Syncing logic between backend tools and Shopify proved complex. The webhook configurations, user authentication, and dynamic data manipulation that the app required all presented steep technical learning curves.

“Even with some coding experience, it was clear that building this from scratch would be time-consuming and error-prone,” said Chris.

‍

The solution

After extensive research, he discovered Gadget, a full-stack app development platform purpose-built for Shopify apps. It came complete with Shopify native data models, a built-in integration to Shopify’s APIs and an AI assistant expertly trained on developing for Shopify.

“I signed up for Gadget the same day I discovered it. It immediately clicked. The AI Assistant helped quickly onboard me, guide development, and understand the Shopify ecosystem more clearly than I imagined was possible,” said Chris.

Vasken added, “The AI tool really was a game changer. It helped us understand Gadget as a whole, so we were building in one unified system.”

Gadget provided all of the infrastructure to set up and host the app, along with an instant connection to Shopify. In a matter of minutes, the app was up and running — live in Shopify with all of the real-time data they needed. Instead of wasting hours on manually setting up the Shopify backend, APIs, and dealing with OAuth, Chris and Vasken jumped right into solving their business problem.

From there, Gadget’s AI assistant allowed the team to work impossibly fast. It helped troubleshoot issues, explain webhooks, and even suggested clean code patterns, which deepened their understanding of the platform as a whole. The more they understood how everything was connected, the faster they worked.

Chris explained, “The AI assistant just unlocked our potential. The more we knew, the better we got and the faster we worked — it felt like this compound effect on efficiency.”

Using Gadget, the team was able to design, develop, and launch the Shopify application in half of the originally projected time.

• Sales Earnings Dashboard – Displays monthly commissions, dynamically adjusted 
• Role-Based Access – Sales associates view only their data, while managers can assign or adjust sales
• Report Downloads – Exports clean, readable summaries
• Shopify Integration – Pulls staff names, order, and custom data directly from Shopify with no manual input

‍

‍

The results

Within weeks, PayCalc was a reality. Chris and Vasken had developed a full-stack, custom Shopify app. They managed to design and develop a full app, without needing to spend months on trial and error. 

PayCalc met all the key requirements: it automatically assigned every order to a salesperson, allowed the sales team to view their earnings in real time, provided leadership with performance reports, and enabled managers to assign sales to the appropriate team members — all powered by Gadget and Shopify.

In the end, Gadget allowed for:

• 50% faster launch than the original 3–4 month scope
• Zero friction adoption across the sales team with an intuitive UX and UI
• A full backend integration with Shopify to support long-term scalability
• No more manual tracking of commissions or Excel-based reports

The app is more than just a commission tracker — it’s a custom-built solution that reflects the company’s commitment to empowering sales teams, embracing innovation, and scaling intelligently.

Chris shared, “This app proves what’s possible when design, development, and business operations align. We’re proud to have built something that will help companies grow.”