Pantastic
Commerce tools for independent brands, first a marketplace of hand-picked Shopify brands, then apps for merchants. Design direction, prototypes, and marketing.
- Years
- 2020–2023
- Role
- Founding product designer
- Setup
- Palo Alto company; I worked remotely from the Philippines
- Scope
- Product direction, interface design, front-end prototypes, marketing design
- Platform
- Web
The company
Pantastic started in Palo Alto in 2020 with a bet on independent brands. Its first product was the Shoppe, which gathered hand-picked independent Shopify brands in one place for shoppers, with a merchant side for the brands selling through it.
In March 2022 the company announced $18 million in equity and debt financing led by B Capital Group, alongside the purchase of two existing Shopify apps: UpOrder, for order emails, and CartHook Post Purchase Offers. LimeSpot followed that August, and Refersion’s affiliate platform in July 2023. In three years Pantastic went from a marketplace for shoppers to software for the merchants themselves.
The work
I joined as founding product designer in June 2020 and worked remotely from the Philippines for the next three years. The job followed the company. I led design directions for both sides of the business: shoppers, and the brands and merchants Pantastic served. Most of that meant turning an idea on a call into something the team could click through, test, and argue about the same week.
I also wrote front-end code. I designed, built, and deployed prototypes to production alongside product and engineering, which meant a promising direction could reach real customers without waiting for a separate build. And I set the design direction for marketing campaigns aimed at both audiences, with the marketing team and outside contractors.
What carried over
Pantastic changed direction while I was there. I now judge a first version by how easily it can change, as well as by how it looks on launch day. Three things help: a clear structure, plain names, and few enough parts to move with the business.