Chill Your Beans - Hyvä Coffee Shop

Chill Your Beans is an ambitious personal project with a clear mission: prove that small businesses can thrive using Magento 2 in 2026.

With Hyvä's new free license tier, the barrier to entry for enterprise-grade e-commerce has dramatically lowered. This project takes advantage of that to build a real coffee shop e-commerce site that demonstrates modern Magento best practices.

**Project Goals:**

• Achieve 90+ Lighthouse scores across all metrics • Maintain sub-2-second page load times • Keep monthly running costs under £50 • Implement full payment and shipping integration • Create a template for other small businesses to follow

**Technical Approach:**

Built on Magento 2.4.8 with Hyvä's free license, leveraging Alpine.js and Tailwind CSS for a modern, lightweight frontend. Focus on performance optimization, smart caching strategies, and cost-effective hosting solutions.

**Business Model Testing:**

The site will sell specialty coffee beans and brewing equipment, with a focus on sustainable sourcing and education. Revenue will reinvest in expanding inventory and marketing.

**Lessons & Documentation:**

Every decision is documented - from initial setup to launch and beyond. The goal is to create a comprehensive guide for other developers and entrepreneurs considering Magento for small business use cases.

**Current Status:**

In active development. Core functionality complete, working on payment integration and inventory management. Launch targeted for 2026.

This project challenges the common perception that Magento is "too expensive" or "too complex" for small businesses. With the right approach and modern tools like Hyvä, it's more accessible than ever.