Shopify Entrepreneur Weekly

Hi there,

We’ve made it through another Black Friday/Cyber Monday — and while the dust is still settling, the impact is already clear:
Shoppers showed up. Merchants delivered. And the ecosystem had… a few moments.

This week’s issue covers:

• The Cyber Monday outage Shopify didn’t talk about

• The real BFCM numbers that matter

• Shopify’s Winter Editions’25 roundup

• One app worth installing before holiday traffic continues

Let’s jump in 👇

Shopify BFCM results

1. Shopify’s Cyber Monday admin outage — and the silence that followed

On the biggest sales day of the year, Shopify’s backend went down for ~6 hours — preventing merchants from logging into admin, editing themes, fulfilling orders, launching deals, or accessing POS.

Stores remained customer-facing, but merchants were effectively locked out from running their businesses.

Learn more → 

2. Who crushed BFCM? The numbers are in.

Despite the hiccups, BFCM was massive:

• $14.6B in sales from Shopify merchants (+27% YoY)

• 81M+ customers bought from Shopify stores

• 94,900+ merchants had their best day ever

• Average cart: $114.70

• Top categories: cosmetics, apparel, activewear

• BNPL usage: $1.03B on Cyber Monday alone

Now is the time to maximize December sales with retention offers and stronger post-purchase flows.

Shopify Winter ’26 Editions is here — and it’s big

A new world of commerce, with 150+ product updates. Here’s a quick, scannable roundup of what’s new 👇

🤖 Sidekick (AI, leveled up)

• Proactive insights and next steps tailored to your store

• Build custom apps, workflows, reports, and segments just by describing them

• Edit themes, images, and emails with simple prompts

• Voice chat, full-screen mode, better memory, and reusable AI “Skills”

• Manages B2B companies, transfers money, finds apps, and more

🧠 Agentic Commerce

• Sell products directly inside AI chats (ChatGPT, Copilot, Perplexity)

• Control how your brand appears in AI-powered shopping experiences

• One setup → product discovery across multiple AI platforms

🛍️ Online Store & Themes

• Built-in A/B testing and scheduled rollouts

• AI simulates shopper behavior before you launch

• Generate and publish themes from the mobile app

• Sell on WordPress with native Shopify checkout

• 2048 product variants, unlisted products, smarter collections

• Faster Horizon themes + better theme discovery

• AI-generated stores before signup

📣 Marketing

• Shopify Product Network to earn commission selling other brands’ products

• Shop Campaigns expand across more channels

• Native SMS marketing in Shopify Messaging

• Auto-translated forms, smarter segmentation, dynamic email content

• Unified calendar view for email + SMS

💳 Checkout & Payments

• Personalized Shop Pay button with saved card details

• Market-specific checkout customization (including B2B)

• Shop Pay Installments in the UK

• Apple Pay inside Shop Pay

• Faster, AI-assisted Shopify Payments onboarding

• Klarna and local payment methods in more countries

⚙️ Operations & Analytics

• Flexible inventory transfers and flash sales across locations

• Heatmaps, bot filtering, minute-level analytics

• Full inventory history (no 180-day limit)

• Redesigned Flow editor with previews and cancellations

• Passkeys for password-free login

💰 Finance

• Ongoing funding via Shopify Capital flex account

• Automatic payout splitting in Shopify Balance

• Staff cards with spend controls

• Better rewards, fraud alerts, real-time transfers

• Track true international profit margins

If you want to:

• Roll out Sidekick automations before your competitors

• Optimize checkout, B2B, or POS with the latest features

• Test AI storefronts, A/B rollouts, or new payment methods the right way

• Avoid costly setup mistakes while moving fast

👉 shopexperts.com matches you with the right Shopify expert for your exact needs — devs, designers, CRO, B2B, Plus, and POS specialists.

This summary barely scratches the surface.

👉 Go explore the full Winter ’26 Editions — it’s interactive, fun, and packed with easter eggs worth clicking around for.

App spotlight: Kim – Smarter support for busy Shopify teams

We don’t often feature apps here, but this one is genuinely worth a look — especially after BFCM, when inboxes explode and small teams feel the pressure.

Kim.cc helps brands manage customer support with a blend of human and AI-powered assistance. Everything — email, chat, Messenger, Instagram — funnels into one clean inbox, and AI helps draft fast, accurate replies so your team can stay focused on revenue-driving work.

The company is growing fast too: Kim.cc recently raised $6M+ in funding from marquee investors and is already supporting 70+ DTC brands.

Why merchants are trying it right now:

• Centralized support during peak season

• Human + AI blended workflows

• Faster responses with less manual typing

• Built specifically for lean ecommerce teams

They offer a 15-day free trial and ongoing free helpdesk support to help you get set up.

👉 Check out Kim.cc →

New premium themes

Metro by Shine Dezign Infonet — $380 USD
A chic, modern theme for home-decor brands. Built with 30+ flexible sections, polished product imagery, and B2B-ready features like bulk ordering, tiered pricing, and multi-currency support.

Victory by UTD — $320 USD
A vibrant, high-energy theme for food and beverage stores. Smooth transitions, animated sections, and built-in upsells help boost AOV — all backed by reliable performance and responsive support.

Photo of the week

We picked the main screen of Shopify Winter ’26 Editions as our Photo of the Week because… well, everyone’s talking about it right now — and it’s actually beautiful and fun.

It feels like a Renaissance Edition with AI — classic inspiration meets modern intelligence, wrapped in a site that’s genuinely enjoyable to explore.

Curious — which update are you most excited about?
Just hit reply and tell us — we read all the comments

Need a hand after BFCM or with Winter ’26 updates?

If your store broke, slowed down, or just feels “off”, we can help you diagnose and fix the highest-impact issues fast — and get you using the latest Editions updates before everyone else.

💬 Submit your project → shopexperts.com

Quick poll – How did your BFCM go?

December isn’t slowing down — and neither are we.
You keep building. We’ll keep helping.

See you in 2 weeks.

—

with 🤍 shopexperts team