Modernizing NMJ’s Magento 2 storefront with Hyvä

See how Kiwee modernized NMJ’s Magento 2 B2C and B2B stores with Hyvä while protecting integrations, operations, and customer familiarity.

Detailed model electric locomotive number 14 2197 travelling through a miniature railway landscape

About NMJ: Scandinavia's Leading Model Railway Retailer

NMJ is one of Scandinavia’s leading retailers and manufacturers of model railways, trains, accessories, and related equipment. The company manages a complex catalogue of around 20,000 products, with pricing, stock, orders, and warehouse data synchronized between Magento and its external business systems.

Kiwee has supported NMJ since 2012, helping migrate the store from Magento 1 to Magento 2, develop custom functionality, integrate ERP and warehouse systems, and provide ongoing maintenance and technical support.

The latest stage of the partnership focused on implementing Hyvä to create a faster, lighter, and more maintainable Magento 2 frontend.

Yellow and red diesel locomotive model displayed on railway tracks

Black steam locomotive and tender model photographed against a white background

Red diesel locomotive model photographed against a white background

20,000+

products in the catalogue

14+

years of partnership

3mo

project delivery time

The Challenge: Magento 2 Frontend Limitations

NMJ's Magento store had supported the business for years, but the frontend was still running on Luma, and its age was starting to show in both the design and the way content was managed.

The store is also a working tool for the people who use it. Many NMJ customers have been buying from the company for years and know exactly where to find what they are looking for. Any change to the frontend would also change how they shop.

The challenge was therefore to balance three priorities:

Improve content management and the frontend foundation.

Modernize the design and overall shopping experience.

Preserve the familiar NMJ identity, structure, and usability.

Before-and-after comparison of the NMJ product page, showing a simplified header, larger product image, vertical gallery, improved search, and consolidated purchase information after the redesign — *The product page before and after the Hyvä rebuild — a compact gallery, grouped product details, and a shorter path to add-to-cart.*

Why Hyvä Is the Right Fit for Magento 2 Stores Like NMJ

NMJ already had a strong Magento setup supporting its catalogue, B2C and B2B operations, custom functionality, and integrations. A full replatforming would have added unnecessary cost and risk.

Hyvä made it possible to modernize the frontend while keeping this existing ecosystem in place. Its lighter architecture also provides a cleaner, more maintainable foundation for future development.

Man wearing headphones and working on a laptop in an office surrounded by plants.

The Solution: A Custom Hyvä Theme for B2C and B2B

Kiwee recommended Hyvä as the new frontend solution and set out to:

Replace the existing frontend with a custom Hyvä implementation for the main B2C store.
Build a dedicated Hyvä theme for the B2B store view.
Preserve the brand identity and familiar shopping journey.
Adapt existing Magento features and third-party services to the new frontend.
Improve product discovery, navigation, content management, and ordering.
Create a setup that could be maintained efficiently and extended to additional storefronts.
Replace Luma Checkout with Hyvä Checkout

Delivering the Migration Without Disrupting the Store

A safer migration

Hyvä was developed alongside the existing Luma theme.

This allowed NMJ to keep the current store running while the new frontend was developed and tested, reducing the risk of the final cutover.

UX Improvements: Navigation, Search, and Product Discovery

The redesign focused on making product discovery and shopping easier. Key improvements included:

Featured product galleries with direct add-to-cart.
A simplified header with grouped account, language, and cart controls.
A more compact mobile header.
Improved search suggestions in a compact popup.
More compact product cards and optimized category and product pages.

NMJ online store homepage featuring a model steam locomotive and the redesigned search and navigation — The redesigned NMJ storefront, built with Hyvä for Magento 2.

Hyvä CMS with Version-Controlled Content Deployment

Kiwee rebuilt the homepage, topbar, and footer with Hyvä CMS and introduced version-controlled content deployment across dev, staging, and production.

This reduces manual work, keeps content consistent between environments, and makes future releases easier to manage.

Adapting Magento Integrations to Hyvä: ElasticSuite, Klarna, PayPal

Existing Magento functionality was adapted to the new Hyvä frontend, including ElasticSuite, Klarna Checkout, PayPal Express, reCAPTCHA, and custom Magento features.

Legacy frontend widgets were also rebuilt where needed for Hyvä’s Alpine.js-based architecture.

The Results: A Modern, Future-Ready Magento Storefront

The project delivered:

A modern, more intuitive storefront across desktop and mobile.
Hyvä CMS and Hyvä Checkout.
Easier and more consistent content deployment.
Existing Magento integrations and custom functionality preserved.
A maintainable frontend foundation ready for future storefronts

What NMJ's CEO Says About Working With Kiwee

For NMJ, the cooperation with Kiwee has been a success story from the beginning. Their technical knowledge, reliability, work ethic, and customer-first mindset have been essential to our online success.

The move to Hyvä is another strong example of this partnership. Kiwee helped us modernize the storefront while preserving the integrations, functionality, and familiar shopping experience our business depends on. We now have a faster, more modern frontend and a solid foundation for future growth.

Kiwee’s team has my warmest recommendations.

Knut Moe

Norsk Modelljernbane AS, Oslo, Norway

Hyvä Migration Services Delivered by Kiwee

Custom B2C and B2B theme implementation based on Hyvä Themes
UX and interface redesign
Hyvä CMS implementation
Hyvä Checkout implementation
Version-controlled content deployment
Search, payment compatibility
Custom Magento feature adaptation
Homepage, navigation, category, product, and checkout improvements
Multilingual content for different storefronts
Controlled release and cutover planning
Full backward compatibility in the unlikely event of a rollback