Saskia Teichmann
At the end of 2020, I received a call from the managing director of Raumluft24 Klimatechnik GmbH. “Are you at your computer? Just open our online store … I don’t think I need to say much more, do I?” Before long, we were deep in a detailed consultation. The first outline for the new store took shape during that conversation.
I brought in the right design partner. Once the proposal was accepted, we moved straight into concept development and design; the new website went live in February 2021. Since then, I have continued to develop it and look after the technology behind its day-to-day operation.
Raumluft24 sells a comparatively small range of air conditioners. Over the years, a complex e-commerce system has grown behind it. The client has a sales team but no technical department of its own. I fill that role: I run the server, maintain the store, develop custom features and advise on how to implement new requirements technically.
The systems behind the store
Since the relaunch, we have expanded the website step by step. We added dedicated landing pages—entry pages built for a specific purpose—and a blog. An interactive tool to help customers choose an air conditioner and further information on energy efficiency complemented the store. We also built a protected internal store for dealers and spare parts.
The same website now serves several very different purposes. Anyone looking for information about an air conditioner uses the public store. Dealers and other business customers can get detailed advice by phone and place their orders. The friendly team is happy to help and uses the protected store area to do so. The air conditioner selection tool has to fit into the system just as the ordering features do. Integrations add further processes, including payments, invoices and shipping.
When I develop a custom feature, I need to understand these connections. A change can affect areas that are not visible on the page in question. Part of my work is therefore to translate the sales team’s requirements into a technical solution and check its impact on the existing store.
Server operations and store development go hand in hand here
Caching is a good example. We use several caches so that the store does not have to rebuild all its content on every request. The server can keep ready-made public pages available; another cache layer holds frequently needed data. I set up the server myself and configured it entirely around the store’s requirements. I manage its day-to-day operation and keep the server infrastructure aligned with the store’s features.
The quality of this setup becomes particularly apparent under heavy load—for example during major advertising campaigns, computationally demanding requests or waves of bot attacks. What matters then is that the server and website work together as a carefully designed, coordinated system.
Different rules apply to the cart, checkout and logged-in customers than to a public product page. Here, the store must take each purchase and the individual session into account. These areas and individual states are therefore specifically excluded from the page cache. The technical task is to reuse content sensibly while accommodating the processes that differ from one purchase to the next.
A page delivered quickly also tells us little about how fast the entire ordering process is. Integrations and additional background requests matter too. When maintaining the system, I therefore examine how the server, store and these requests work together. Looking only at the visible page would leave a substantial part of the work out of view.
Developing the store while it stays in operation
A current example is the new product pages, which have been online since September 2026. I implemented the design and connected it to the existing store features. Key specifications appear right next to the purchasing area, while more detailed information can be expanded. The product comparison lets visitors view room size, noise level and energy efficiency class side by side, for example.
I prepare major changes and software updates in a separate test environment. There, I check the changes alongside the existing features before they are transferred to the public store. To me, that is part of taking responsibility for a system that continues to process orders while development is ongoing.
Advising the client also means bringing in the right specialists. About a year and a half ago, I brought in one of my search engine advertising partners and introduced him to the client. He specializes in paid search; since then, the advertising campaigns have been continuously optimized through this collaboration. As with the design partner at the start, I brought the right complementary expertise into the project.
When the Raumluft24 team needs a new feature, they can come to me with the business requirement. Working out which technical components need to change and how they will work with the existing store is my responsibility. It helps that I have been involved since the first concept and also look after its day-to-day operation.
If your store has grown technically beyond what your team can manage on its own, please get in touch.
