Leading Bedding Manufacturer Scales Platform 3x During COVID-19 Demand Surge

Client: Leading Bedding Products Manufacturer

September 24, 2024

When a leading bedding products manufacturer faced unprecedented COVID-19 demand and chronic deployment downtime, Creatuity delivered a comprehensive platform transformation—implementing zero-downtime deployments and scaling infrastructure to handle 12,000+ concurrent users while maintaining sub-second performance.

ABOUT THE CLIENT

A prominent American company specializing in bedding products—including pillows, mattresses, bed sheets, and sleep accessories—operates primarily as a direct-to-consumer business through their Adobe Commerce e-commerce platform. With thousands of SKUs and millions in annual online revenue, the platform is critical to their business operations.

THE CHALLENGE

The client faced two critical challenges that threatened their business:

COVID-19 Traffic Surge: After redirecting 75% of production to manufacture face masks for healthcare workers, the resulting publicity caused traffic to surge dramatically. Their existing Magento Open Source implementation would crash at 5,000 concurrent visitors, with add-to-cart times exceeding 30 seconds or timing out completely.

Deployment Downtime: The existing deployment process required approximately 1.5 hours of maintenance mode per deployment. Even with overnight deployment windows, this resulted in tens of thousands of dollars in lost sales per deployment and a diminished customer experience.

THE SOLUTION

Creatuity implemented a comprehensive platform transformation with two parallel initiatives:

Phase 1: Emergency COVID-19 Scaling (62 hours)

Adobe Commerce Migration: Rapidly migrated from Magento Open Source to Adobe Commerce to access enterprise scalability features.

Split Database Architecture: Implemented Adobe Commerce’s split database feature, dividing operations into three independent databases (CMS, sales, checkout) for horizontal scaling.

Code & Server Optimization: Comprehensive optimization of codebase and server configuration for high-traffic scenarios.

Rapid Timeline: Completed the entire migration in 62 hours:

Commerce migration: 10 hours
Split scripts: 42 hours
QA: 10 hours

Phase 2: Zero-Downtime Deployment Implementation

Deployment Process Redesign: Re-engineered deployments to eliminate maintenance mode, allowing continuous customer access.

Background Task Management: Carefully managed background processes and system updates to prevent slowdowns or errors.

Gradual Rollout: Implemented staged code deployment across servers to minimize potential issues.

Rollback Safeguards: Established rapid rollback capabilities and synchronized testing environments.

Infrastructure Optimization: Achieved improvements without additional infrastructure investment.

THE RESULTS

Traffic Handling Capacity

Scaled from 5,000 (crash threshold) to 12,000+ concurrent users
140% increase in platform capacity

Performance Under Load

Add-to-cart time: 30+ seconds → <1 second
Consistent response times even during traffic spikes

Deployment Efficiency

Eliminated 1.5 hours of downtime per deployment
Zero lost sales during deployments
Maintenance mode now only needed for major Adobe Commerce version updates (a few times per year)

Business Impact

Primary concern shifted from “will the site crash?” to “will we run out of inventory?”
Continuous store availability during updates
No additional infrastructure costs required

CAPABILITIES DELIVERED

Migration: Rapid 62-hour migration from Magento Open Source to Adobe Commerce
Performance: 30x improvement in response time; zero-downtime deployments
B2B: Scalable infrastructure for high-volume direct-to-consumer operations

INTEGRATIONS

NetSuite: ERP integration for order management, inventory synchronization, and financial operations
PayPal: High-volume payment processing with fraud protection
Elasticsearch: Fast, scalable search across thousands of products
Stripe: Alternative payment processing for customer flexibility

TECHNICAL HIGHLIGHTS

Advanced Adobe Commerce Customization: Deep expertise in Adobe Commerce enabled continuous operation even during database structure updates.

Split Database Architecture: Three-database separation (CMS, sales, checkout) allows independent scaling and eliminates database bottlenecks.

Robust Deployment Pipeline: New procedure balances live updates with system integrity and customer experience.

Risk Management: Proactive handling of database locks, code synchronization, and rollback scenarios.

CONCLUSION

This comprehensive platform transformation demonstrates Creatuity’s ability to solve complex, multi-faceted e-commerce challenges. By combining emergency scaling capabilities with long-term operational improvements, we delivered:

Immediate crisis response: 62-hour migration that saved the business during COVID-19 traffic surge
Sustained operational excellence: Zero-downtime deployments that eliminate revenue loss
Future-proof infrastructure: Scalable architecture ready for continued growth

The project exemplifies how strategic technical expertise can transform business challenges into competitive advantages.

Project Team:

Grzegorz M. – Developers Team Lead & Commerce Migration
Daniel S. – Backend Developer
Paweł M. – Backend Developer
Mateusz L. – Frontend Developer
Cyprian Ż. – Frontend Developer
Arkadiusz D. – QA Developer
Jarosław Z. – QA Developer
Anna K. – Solution Architect
Beata J. – Project Manager