Case study
HIE Labs: branding and web development for an innerwear label
Techrethought worked on branding and web development for HIE Labs, a men's innerwear brand that sells online from its own store. The store runs on Shopify and offers two product lines, each with its colours, sizes, size chart and customer reviews. Pages on the fabric, the pouch, returns and common questions sit alongside the products.
- Business
- Men's innerwear brand
- Location
- Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India
- Industry
- Fashion
- What Techrethought did
- Branding
- Web development
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5 min · The text on this page is the transcript.
01 · The brief
What does HIE Labs sell, and where did we come in?
HIE Labs is a men's innerwear brand that sells from its own online store at thehielabs.com. It needed an identity of its own, and a store where a visitor could understand the product, choose a colour and size, and buy.
The store runs on Shopify, and its footer names no studio. With no credit on the site, this study rests on the two roles on record, branding and web development.
The product photography, the product names and the copy are described here as the store shows them. They are not part of the role on record, and this study does not claim them.
02 · Challenges
What does an innerwear store have to answer?
Innerwear bought online cannot be tried on first, so the store has to settle questions of fit, fabric and returns on its own pages.
Fit without a fitting room
Every product comes in a run of sizes, and each product page links to a size chart. A shopper had to be able to check the fit before ordering, and to know what happens if it is wrong.
A difference that photos do not show
The products differ from ordinary innerwear in their fabric and in a pouch the brand calls BALLinTECH. The store needed room to explain both in words, apart from the product pages.
Many colours on one product
One product line comes in more than a dozen colours and a long run of sizes. The product page had to keep many colour and size choices readable in one place.
03 · What we built
What did we make for HIE Labs?
The roles on record are branding and web development. We designed the HIE Labs identity and developed the Shopify store at thehielabs.com, whose main parts are listed below.
- The HIE Labs mark and wordmark
- We designed the identity the store carries: a mark of solid black blocks that reads as H, I and E, beside HIE LABS in thin, widely spaced capitals. The header uses the mark alone, and the footer sets the mark beside the wordmark.
- A page for each product line
- Coolism Trunks and Airmax Boxers each have one page with colour swatches, a size run, a size chart, materials, wash care and delivery terms.
- Pages on the pouch and the fabric
- A BALLinTECH page and an About page explain the pouch and the fabric at length, away from the product pages.
- Answers before and after buying
- An FAQs page covers shipping, order tracking, returns, stock and washing, and a separate page sets out the refund and replacement terms for a first pair.
- Contact, blog and news
- The contact page has a form, a support email, a phone number and the address, and the footer links a blog and a page of news articles about the brand.
04 · Services and tech
What does the store run on?
The store runs on Shopify, with a theme from the Shopify Theme Store and apps for reviews and sign-in, as its page source shows.
Services used
Seen in the page source
- Shopify
- The store, its product pages, cart and checkout run on Shopify.The footer reads Powered by Shopify, and assets load from the store's cdn/shop paths and cdn.shopify.com.
- Broadcast theme
- The store's layout is built on Broadcast, a theme from the Shopify Theme Store.Shopify.theme in the page source names the schema Broadcast, version 7.1.0, with theme_store_id 868.
- Judge.me reviews
- Product pages show customer reviews and a form to write one.The Judge.me app extension under cdn.shopify.com/extensions, and its review widget with a Write a review button on both product pages.
- GoKwik KwikPass
- Shoppers sign in to their account through GoKwik's KwikPass.Scripts referencing XGokwikCoreToken and kpHandleLogin, and the SDK at pdp.gokwik.co/jify/build/sdk.js.
- hCaptcha
- The contact form is protected by hCaptcha.The contact page states the site is protected by hCaptcha and links to its privacy policy and terms.
05 · Outcome
What can a shopper do on the store today?
HIE Labs’ store is live at thehielabs.com and runs on Shopify, and its footer credits no studio.
What a visitor can do there
Choose between the two product lines, Coolism Trunks and Airmax Boxers, from the Shop Now menu.
Pick a colour and a size on a product page, and check the size chart first.
Choose a single pair or a multi-pack, then add it to the cart or buy it straight away.
Read customer reviews on each product page, and write one.
Read how the pouch and the fabric are made, and the refund terms for a first pair.
Reach HIE Labs through the contact form, by email or by phone, or find answers on the FAQs page.
Have a project like this in mind?
Tell us about your business and what the work needs to do, and we will suggest where to start.
Or call +91 88258 07825 or +91 93821 94201, or email [email protected].