Shiner Case Study
Owtanet has worked with Shiner since 2010 as a long‑term IT partner, providing cloud hosting, software development, IT security, and secondary technical support to help support and scale the business as it has grown.
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Over the course of this relationship, Owtanet has supported the growth of Shiner’s digital and operational platforms, working closely with internal teams to ensure that core systems remain reliable, adaptable, and capable of supporting the company’s international operations and ongoing development needs.
Supporting distribution, licensing, and manufacture of action sports and lifestyle products.
Services Provided
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IT Consultancy
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AWS Hosting
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Bespoke Software Development
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IT Security
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System Integrations & API Development
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Senior Level Support
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Key Outcomes
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Scalable B2B platform across multiple territories, languages, and currencies
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Centralised ordering and stock management
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AWS scaling with business demand
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Reliable, secure systems supporting international operations
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Ongoing access to senior technical expertise
Background
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Shiner is a third‑generation, family‑owned business specialising in the distribution, licensing, and manufacture of action sports and lifestyle products. With over forty years of experience, the company operates internationally, supporting a portfolio of global brands across skateboarding, action sports, apparel, and associated lifestyle categories. Shiner’s operations are headquartered in the UK, with additional warehousing and distribution facilities in Europe and the United States, enabling the business to serve customers across multiple territories.
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A significant part of Shiner’s operation centres on its B2B sales model, supplying retailers across different regions with varied product ranges and brand assortments. This requires systems capable of handling multiple languages, currencies, territories, and sales workflows, while integrating seamlessly with existing business processes such as stock management, pre‑stock sales, catalogue generation, and customer‑facing digital channels.
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As Shiner’s scale and international reach expanded, the complexity of these systems increased. Maintaining dependable, flexible infrastructure, without creating unnecessary operational overhead, became critical to supporting day‑to‑day trading, logistics, and long‑term growth. At Owtanet, we are able to help with the ongoing role in designing, developing, and supporting platforms that could grow alongside the business.
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The Challenge
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As Shiner’s operations and international footprint expanded, the demands placed on its digital platforms and supporting infrastructure increased significantly. The business required systems capable of supporting multiple brands, territories, languages, and currencies, while remaining dependable during peak trading periods and flexible enough to grow alongside changing commercial and operational requirements.
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As the scale and importance of Shiner’s platforms increased, there were practical limits to how much specialist development, infrastructure design, and optimisation could be handled without additional technical support.
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Shiner needed an approach that would allow its systems to scale in line with the business, remain resilient and secure, and integrate effectively with existing processes, while ensuring experienced technical support was available when required.
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The Solution
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AWS Cloud Hosting
To support Shiner’s growth and avoid the need for ongoing investment in physical data‑centre infrastructure, Owtanet implemented an AWS‑hosted, on‑demand cloud solution. This approach provided the flexibility to scale resources as required, ensuring that systems could grow alongside the business without being constrained by fixed infrastructure capacity.
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Owtanet set up and continues to manage and monitor the AWS environment on an ongoing basis, providing 24/7 management. Additional security controls are in place to help protect Shiner’s platforms and data, ensuring that the infrastructure remains resilient, secure, and reliable as business demands evolve.
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Software Development
Owtanet designed and developed a bespoke B2B retail system to support Shiner’s international sales operations. The platform is multilingual and multicurrency, and integrates with existing business systems to manage both in‑stock and pre‑stock sales across multiple territories.
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In addition to the B2B platform, Owtanet has delivered supporting systems, including catalogue generation and business‑to‑consumer websites. These systems form part of a wider digital ecosystem that supports Shiner’s sales, marketing, and operational workflows.
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Secondary IT Support
Alongside platform development and hosting, Owtanet provides ongoing secondary IT support to Shiner. This includes senior‑level technical support and assistance with integration work, such as connecting core systems with marketing platforms and other third‑party services.
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This approach ensures that Shiner has access to experienced technical expertise when required, without the need to maintain additional specialist resources internally.​​​​
We’ve been working with Owtanet for over fifteen years. During that time, they have supported our item category growth and territory expansion with the production and continued support of a bespoke, multi category, multi-territory and multi-language B2B website.
Periodically, we have completed cost and benefit audits with several different B2B providers. Each time we have discovered that none of Owtanet’s competitors can handle the complexity of our B2B operation or compete on cost.
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Driven by their understanding of our complex distribution and retail mix; Owtanet have been well placed to support us in many other aspects of the business, and in addition to provisioning our B2B, Owtanet have also supported us with countless ad hoc requests, ranging from catalogue generation, API integrations and Klavio segment creation.
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Pro-active in their approach, we know that if systems go down, the fix will be quick and a future solution will be implemented.
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In addition, throughout our relationship, the team at Owtanet have been responsive, effective and supportive
Richard Staite, Chief Operating Officer
​​Results
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By working with Owtanet as a long-term IT partner, Shiner now operates on a technology platform designed to support the complexity of its international sales and distribution models.
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Key outcomes include:
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A centralised B2B retail platform that supports multiple languages, currencies, territories, and sales workflows, enabling Shiner to manage international ordering requirements through a single system.
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Improved integration with existing business systems, supporting both in-stock and pre-stock sales across multiple territories and reducing reliance on manual or disconnected processes.
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Supporting digital platforms, including catalogue generation and business‑to‑consumer websites, that form part of a wider ecosystem supporting sales, marketing, and operational activity.
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A scalable AWS‑hosted infrastructure, allowing systems to grow in line with demand without the need to invest in or manage physical data‑centre hardware.
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Ongoing infrastructure management, monitoring, and security, helping to ensure systems remain reliable and secure as they continue to support business‑critical operations.
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Access to senior‑level technical support and specialist expertise, including assistance with system integrations such as marketing platforms, without the need to increase internal overhead.
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Overall, this approach has provided Shiner with a stable and adaptable technology foundation that supports day‑to‑day trading while allowing systems to evolve as the business continues to grow and change.
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Looking for a long‑term IT partner?
If your business is growing, operating across multiple territories, or relying on business‑critical digital platforms, Owtanet can help. We work closely with organisations to design, build, and support practical IT solutions that scale with the business, without adding unnecessary complexity or overhead.