Southern Sheeting was already running Adobe Commerce effectively. Their site was solid, tailored for trade accounts, complex pricing, and the nuances of B2B buying. They had invested in building features that worked for their customers but behind the scenes, their infrastructure was underperforming. The infrastructure and setup couldn't keep pace with their ambitions, creating a bottleneck that held everything else back.

They were still on-premise. And while that might have worked once, it was starting to limit their ability to grow, scale, and adapt.

This isn’t a story about replatforming. It’s about evolution and how the right environment can unlock stability, performance, and peace of mind.

Why the Hosting Setup Had to Change

Southern Sheeting have an exceptionally skilled and knowledgable team. They’ve built one of the most mature Adobe Commerce instances in the construction trade sector. However, their infrastructure wasn’t robust.

Deployments felt risky. Patches were harder to apply cleanly. And seasonal surges needed hands-on intervention to stay stable.

The site itself appeared to function, but behind the scenes, issues were starting to emerge.

Moving to Adobe Commerce Cloud gave them more than a change of scenery. It gave them a future-ready foundation, and the confidence that their site could grow with their business.

A Thoughtful, Low-Risk Migration

At GENE, we don’t jump straight to “tear it down and start again.” We always look for the most effective, least disruptive way to evolve a platform, and that’s exactly what Southern Sheeting needed.

We planned a full migration from their on-premise infrastructure to Adobe Commerce Cloud, ensuring parity across all environments and a seamless switch, with no impact on trading and no loss of custom functionality. It wasn’t dramatic. It was methodical, careful, and engineered for stability.

And that’s what good platform evolution should feel like.

What Changed (and Why It Matters)

Once we made the move, everything started to flow better.

• Security patching became faster, easier, and more predictable with tools like BlueFinch Patch.

• Confidence in the infrastructure was improved supported by Adobe’s cloud services, Sansec and Cloudflare.

• Deployments no longer felt like cliff edges. We introduced a clean CI/CD process, complete with visual regression testing and full rollback support.

• And with improved integration of monitoring tools like New Relic and Site24x7, their team gained better visibility over uptime, load speeds, and overall performance.

These improvements might sound technical (and they are), but what they really gave Southern Sheeting was peace of mind. A stronger, more resilient platform - one they could trust to support the business day in, day out.

Aligning Platform Maturity with Business Ambition

In our eEvo Model™, we often talk about the mismatch between where a business is and what their platform enables.

Southern Sheeting had already made it to what we’d consider Level 4 - they had internal capability, clear growth plans, and a well-structured site. But their infrastructure? It was still operating at Level 2.

This move helped close that gap. It wasn’t about adding features…it was about removing friction. And that’s a win just as valuable as any front-end transformation.

Made Better with Unlimited Support

One of the lovely things about working with Southern Sheeting is their focus on stability and partnership - values we really share at GENE.

Since completing the migration, they’ve continued to work with us through Unlimited Support, which gives them full confidence in their day-to-day operations. From performance reviews and patching to frontend improvements and roadmap planning, we’re there as an extension of their team.

Hosting isn’t something you “set and forget.” It evolves. And our job is to keep it moving in the right direction, with as little stress as possible.

Final Thoughts

I always think the best platform improvements are the ones that just work - that quietly reduce stress, improve performance, and make life easier for the people running the site.

That’s exactly what this project was.

Southern Sheeting didn’t need to start again. They just needed to be supported in moving to a better foundation, one that protects the work they’ve already done and gives them space to grow.

It was a pleasure to help make that happen.

Ready to evolve your platform without starting from scratch

If your infrastructure is holding you back, it’s time to realign with a foundation that matches your ambition. Whether you're already operating at Level 5 or just beginning your move away from on-prem, we’ll help you transition with minimal disruption and maximum impact.