Before / After · Case Study
Big Moose Hemp migrated from a legacy Wix storefront (built as a black-box platform) to a fully-owned headless architecture: Medusa 2.x commerce backend on Railway + Next.js 15 storefront on Vercel, deployed to new.bigmoosehemp.com. The rebuild was forced by a hard regulatory deadline—the November 12, 2026 federal hemp ban (P.L. 119-37) that outlaws ~86% of their current catalog, making Wix's locked-in schema and deprecated APIs a business blocker. The team built 551 TypeScript files, 229 commits, and complete parity with legacy order/customer data (142 Wix orders materialized + 16k+ customer archive), plus compliance automation (total-THC calculation per SKU, state ship-block enforcement), real payment rails (Clover high-risk processor), and operational tools (chat, admin orders, approval pipeline). Live site now handles exam-stage orders with full traceability for a business operating in the high-risk hemp/CBD space.
“Wix can't support the business beyond 2026. The federal hemp ban removes 86% of the catalog by Nov 12. A headless rebuild is the only path to survive and pivot.”
Receipts — measured
The pixel diff
Left: everything the legacy site shipped — frozen in place. Right: an auto-scrolling tour of the rebuild, from hero to booking. No slider to fight with.
This is everything the legacy site had to offer above the fold. No pricing, no calendar, no booking — the funnel ended at a mailto.
Auto-scrolls through the modern site so you can see the booking surface, the package grid, the pricing table, and the calendar inline — without leaving this page.
The four beats
Scroll past the legacy frame. The four beats land in order. At the end, the modern site fades into the same window.
THCa + THCP + D9 gummies become Schedule I substances under the new total-THC rule. Wix's locked schema and deprecated APIs mean pivoting to a compliant catalog (adaptogen coffee, CBD, CBG hemp) would take 6+ months. The runway to ship a new stack and rebuild the product line is 207 days. Brendon decided: rebuild from ground up on owned infrastructure.
Why Medusa: MIT-licensed, owns data model, plugin ecosystem for payments + shipping. Why Next.js 15: RSC + ISR for SEO, Vercel-native, every file AI-editable. Wix captured offline (76 pages, 65 images, complete content mirror) on May 3, 2026. 43 SKUs, all metadata, all COAs to be uploaded by Brendon.
Phase 3 (completed 2026-06-24): Wix order transaction API exported → 142 orders (#10001–10142) materialized into Medusa Postgres with exact payment/fulfillment history. Customers (16,881 email / 11,354 phone / 7,043 phone-only SMS) migrated to Medusa + Neon ops DB with import-source=wix_archive tags. Kill-switch (BMH_SUPPRESS_ALL_SIDE_EFFECTS) deployed to prevent double-notifies during migration.
Storefront deployed to Vercel (prj_dgfmPr43RnP17MDG1Ac0hnvP5HZT); Medusa backend on Railway (reliable-prosperity). Compliance automation: total-THC calculator per SKU, state ship-blocks, container-cap audits, dynamic sitemap filtering. Clover Ecommerce (sandbox) wired; production MID awaiting GPS ISO approval. Real orders still gated: Clover live creds not yet furnished; kill-switch still ON for Wix-archive orders. DNS cutover to bigmoosehemp.com pending Brendon's approval (currently live at new.bigmoosehemp.com, legacy Wix site still at bigmoosehemp.com).
THCa + THCP + D9 gummies become Schedule I substances under the new total-THC rule. Wix's locked schema and deprecated APIs mean pivoting to a compliant catalog (adaptogen coffee, CBD, CBG hemp) would take 6+ months. The runway to ship a new stack and rebuild the product line is 207 days. Brendon decided: rebuild from ground up on owned infrastructure.
Why Medusa: MIT-licensed, owns data model, plugin ecosystem for payments + shipping. Why Next.js 15: RSC + ISR for SEO, Vercel-native, every file AI-editable. Wix captured offline (76 pages, 65 images, complete content mirror) on May 3, 2026. 43 SKUs, all metadata, all COAs to be uploaded by Brendon.
Phase 3 (completed 2026-06-24): Wix order transaction API exported → 142 orders (#10001–10142) materialized into Medusa Postgres with exact payment/fulfillment history. Customers (16,881 email / 11,354 phone / 7,043 phone-only SMS) migrated to Medusa + Neon ops DB with import-source=wix_archive tags. Kill-switch (BMH_SUPPRESS_ALL_SIDE_EFFECTS) deployed to prevent double-notifies during migration.
Storefront deployed to Vercel (prj_dgfmPr43RnP17MDG1Ac0hnvP5HZT); Medusa backend on Railway (reliable-prosperity). Compliance automation: total-THC calculator per SKU, state ship-blocks, container-cap audits, dynamic sitemap filtering. Clover Ecommerce (sandbox) wired; production MID awaiting GPS ISO approval. Real orders still gated: Clover live creds not yet furnished; kill-switch still ON for Wix-archive orders. DNS cutover to bigmoosehemp.com pending Brendon's approval (currently live at new.bigmoosehemp.com, legacy Wix site still at bigmoosehemp.com).
Architecture
What changed
Each claim ships with concrete evidence — env vars, table names, cadence chips. No marketing fluff.
Built total-THC calculator per SKU (total = THCa * 0.877 + D9 + synthetics), state-ship-block enforcement (HI/ID/IA/MS/NH/SD blocked), and container-cap audits for Phase 3 post-ban. Regulatory math is not optional; it's embedded in every add-to-cart and checkout.
Exported Wix order transaction API, materialized 142 Wix orders (#10001–10142) into Medusa with exact payment/fulfillment history. Customers (16k+ email, 7k+ phone-only SMS contacts) migrated to Medusa + Neon ops DB with import-source=wix_archive tags + full consent preservation.
Wix inbox port completed (PR #70): live-visitor presence + multi-threaded email (Wix-parity). Approval pipeline (Phase 1 + 2): AI classifier for high-value orders (custom policy grounding) + ops queue + staff/admin nav. Unopen: attachments, auto-response, customer-issue archival.
Clover high-risk processor (hemp-friendly ISO reseller) wired as primary; Aeropay (ACH) as backup; Square abandoned. Medusa payment modules handle tokenization, capture, void, and webhook reconciliation. Sandbox creds in progress; production creds awaiting GPS ISO approval.
No page-builder black box. Every component, page, and workflow is TypeScript in git. Claude + Codex can edit without Wix training. 76 storefront pages + 38 backend modules; next major feature (post-ban Phase 3 catalog pivot) is now feasible in weeks, not months.
Wix URLs redirected to Medusa equivalents (generated by `scripts/generate-301-redirects.ts`). ISR (revalidate: 3600) + RSC for SEO; dynamic sitemap filters by compliance phase after Nov 12. Middleware-owned redirect map prevents losing organic equity.