This challenging project involved rewriting a broken, decade-old custom coffee blending functionality for a coffee shop’s e-commerce platform. My role was to engineer a robust, modern, and user-friendly WooCommerce solution from scratch.
Core Challenges & Solutions:
- Multistep Custom Product Configuration: Developed a multistep form allowing customers to:
- Dynamically select coffees and define blend percentages (totaling 100%).
- Integrate WooCommerce attributes (e.g., roast level).
- Name their custom blend and choose package sizes.
- Dynamic Product Creation & Management: Engineered a system where:
- A “placeholder” product was added to the cart with custom data as order meta-data.
- Upon first purchase, the blend was registered as a new WooCommerce product, then listed under “Custom Coffees” for future buyers.
- Seamless Order Processing: Developed a crucial mechanism to intercept and swap the placeholder with the newly created product before final order processing, ensuring accurate inventory and order details.
- Robust Custom Data Handling: Architected the entire custom order data flow from form collection to product conversion.
This project demonstrated advanced WooCommerce development, custom form handling, dynamic product creation, and complex order management, restoring a key feature and improving scalability.