Shop Livvi: Our Story! Part 2

Part 2: Our Story! December 2021 Tristan asked me (Rider) if I would help him create a website that he has had the idea of for many years. He explained his idea in detail and I agreed to help him. For the next month and a half we began researching the market and other online marketplaces to see if the idea was a feasible business idea that was not already being perused by many others. We found that while that is many marketplaces out there we could not find one that relies solely on subscription like we had planned. Once we felt we had plenty of understanding on the competition and possibility of the website we began the development. Everyday after work and school we would start on creating the foundation of the site. Next we started implementing and setting up all of the functionality we needed. Over the next many months the website went through many changes in design, colors, servers, name, theme, and more.

The Name

The name “Shop Livvi” started out being called “2.7”, which soon changed to “Project Vi”. In our thought for our permanent name we decided to go with Vi which means life in French. However, to have a website with .com you need at least 3 letters. This led to us thinking about Live life, Live Vi, Livvi. We found the name that would stick and we were going to use! Livvi.com The only problem was someone else already owned the website Livvi.com so we had to find something no one owned which is how we came to be known as Shop Livvi!

The Theme

Our theme started off with galaxy designs with blues and purples then changed to nature and trees with greens, tans, and browns. There were a few “temporary” designs in between that we knew we weren’t going to stick with. Finally one day Tristan changed the header to be the pink and blue paint video we have now and we both instantly fell in love with it. The whole site colors and themes changed to match the header video, all of our branding and logos changed to match that theme. We finally found the theme that stuck.

PayPal Partner

One of the final tasks we had to complete before going live was getting a partnership with PayPal. We began the process at the end of September and were constantly in contact back and fourth with our representative at PayPal. We had to submit many forms, plans, documents, charts, and more before we were approved to use “PayPal Marketplace”. We finally got approved a month later and were able to set up the connection to PayPal. Setting this connection up took a few more days to get working correctly on both our end and PayPal’s end but then we were finally done. All of the needed features had been set up.

For the next few weeks we polished pages, features, and plans, and officially launched shoplivvi.com on Black Friday of 2022!

Thank you again to everyone who has joined us on this journey so far, and we look forward to serving more and more of your businesses!