Building and supporting Ramsdens’ connected online services

Ramsdens combines financial services and retail across over 170 UK stores. Its websites cover jewellery, travel money, pawnbroking and gold buying. Each one needs to connect customers with the right stock, rate, account, payment, application or branch.

Our work began with Ramsdens Jewellery. The platform has since handled more than 100,000 SKUs, including one-off pre-owned pieces. We have rebuilt the storefront twice since launch and continued to improve payments, search, merchandising and store journeys in between.

We then built dedicated sites for Currency, Pawnbroking, Gold Buying and Ramsdens for Cash. All five connect with Ramsdens’ back-office systems and share branch data. Customer records, rates, products, orders, payments, loans and service information stay joined up across the online and in-store operation.

Five sites could easily have become five different versions of Ramsdens. We created a digital design system that gives each one the same foundations: Goldplay typography, the Ramsdens green and gold palette, shared buttons, forms, navigation patterns, content blocks and branch journeys.

We did not force every service into the same template. Jewellery needs product discovery, baskets and Click & Collect. Travel Money needs live rates and clear ordering. Pawnbroking needs secure applications and account management. Gold Buying needs GoldPak requests and tracking. Ramsdens for Cash needs to bring the wider group and branch network together.

The common rules keep Ramsdens recognisable across all five sites, while leaving room for each service to work properly.

Ramsdens needed to move Jewellery from Visualsoft to Aero with its customer, product and operational data intact. The data migration was a core part of the rebuild.

We migrated products, variants, imagery, pricing, stock, stores, customers, orders and Click & Collect records. We also rebuilt search, product pages, accounts, basket, checkout and aftersales.

From launch, the site connected ecommerce with stores through location search and Click & Collect. It also covered finance, payments, reviews, analytics, product feeds and fraud prevention. Redirects, catalogue structure, content and technical SEO were planned as part of the migration, not picked up after launch.

Ramsdens confirmed in its annual report for the launch year that the rebuilt retail website launched in October 2020 with a new frontend and work to improve product discovery, conversion and search visibility.

Six months after launch, Ramsdens said the new website was loading 60% quicker. Its HY2021 results presentation reported conversion up 45%, organic traffic up 39%, organic revenue up 57% and new users up 40%.

Over the same half year, online jewellery sales doubled to £1.6m and increased from 9% to 17% of jewellery sales. Around 35% of those online sales came from outside the branch catchment, where average transaction value was 75% higher, and Ramsdens described the ecommerce operation as profitable.

Ramsdens Jewellery now uses more than 100 Aero packages and Techquity modules. They cover search, merchandising, Click & Collect, stock, locations, product feeds, fraud prevention, security, reporting and customer accounts.

We developed a bespoke Layby system with scheduled payment capture, reminders, overdue handling, partial payments, early settlement and customer-account visibility. Ramsdens Jewellery supports card and digital-wallet payments through Barclaycard Fuse, Apple Pay and Google Pay, alongside PayPal, Klarna, Clearpay, Payl8r, Novuna finance and specialist online and in-store Layby journeys.

Each service uses Ramsdens’ back-office systems differently. Jewellery connects accounts, Click & Collect and Layby. Currency uses live rates, branch availability and order data. Pawnbroking covers applications, agreements and repayments. Gold Buying handles GoldPak requests and tracking. Ramsdens for Cash keeps branch information consistent across the group.

Branch information and in-store service are built into the sites. Customers can find their nearest branch, check availability, choose Click & Collect and see accurate opening hours and services. Branch teams have product tools to support in-store conversations. The ecommerce delivery links online shopping to accurate branch information and in-store support.

Ramsdens’ teams also have reporting, security and operational tools for stock, orders, merchandising and exceptions.

A catalogue like Ramsdens cannot rely on a one-off search setup. We have kept improving search and filtering around how customers shop, helping people narrow products by metal, size, brand, price, condition and availability.

Ramsdens’ ecommerce team can build landing pages, enrich product content and control campaigns without waiting for development. Video, quick buy, wishlists, recently viewed products and recommendations make the catalogue easier to browse and trade.

We redesigned the storefront in 2022. Ramsdens supported the October launch with investment in TV, SEO, paid search and affiliates. Online sales rose 89% to £3.7m in HY2023. By year end, Ramsdens reported jewellery-site revenue of £6.7m, up 70%, with the online channel contributing more than £1m of profit.

Currency was the next major Ramsdens service we brought onto Aero. Work began in February 2023. The new site launched in July, and Ramsdens said the move from its legacy website had gone smoothly.

The site connects with Ramsdens’ back-office systems for exchange rates, customer records, branch availability, collection dates, orders and payment results. Customers can calculate live rates and order for branch collection, while also finding the Multi Currency Card and international money transfer services.

We later added home delivery with secure ordering, delivery controls, dedicated payment routing and clearer operational reporting. Apple Pay, stronger customer security, clearer order-flow reporting and shared branch data followed.

By FY2025, Ramsdens reported currency Click & Collect order value of £62.9m, up 22% year on year. Home-delivery sales more than doubled to £3.9m.

Pawnbroking and gold buying remain closely tied to Ramsdens’ branches. We gave each service its own online route while reusing the systems and store data already in place.

The Pawnbroking site launched in November 2024. Customers can enquire online, upload photos, link loans opened in a branch and manage agreements, repayments, redemptions and renewals through a secure account. Ramsdens later reported that the site was attracting new customers and improving SEO. Campaigns in FY2025 also generated more leads for higher-value loans.

We started work on Gold Buying in August 2024 and launched the site in February 2025. Customers can request a GoldPak, track it online or find their nearest store. Ramsdens reported that 80% of visitors used the branch locator, showing how the website supports its national store network.

Ramsdens for Cash followed in 2025, bringing travel money, jewellery, watches, gold, pawnbroking, international transfers, stores and careers into one group website. Shared branch data now keeps names, opening hours, available services and visibility consistent across all five sites.

Jewellery ecommerce has grown in every reported year covered by this case study. Ramsdens’ annual reports show sales rising from almost £3.3m in FY2021 to £3.9m in FY2022, £6.7m in FY2023, £7.2m in FY2024 and £8.2m in FY2025. The channel contributed more than £1m of profit in both FY2023 and FY2024. Online revenue represented 19% of jewellery sales in FY2025.

The website also works as a catalogue for branch teams. By FY2025, staff and customers could access around 2,000 premium pre-owned watches, 10,500 unique pre-owned jewellery items and 3,500 new items. No single branch could hold the same range.

Ramsdens brings the retail knowledge, stock, merchandising, marketing and branch teams. We build and support the sites and systems around that operation.

We started the latest Jewellery rebuild in May 2025. The new setup gives Ramsdens configurable layouts across the homepage, header, footer, listings, product pages and editorial content. We also refreshed live search, filters, quick buy, product presentation, nearest-store discovery and Click & Collect.

We finished the redesign in January 2026, and Ramsdens relaunched the site in February. Across the first half of FY2026, Ramsdens reported online jewellery revenue of £5.0m, around 35% ahead of the comparative period.

Ramsdens works directly with the people delivering its sites. That continuity keeps decisions moving and means the team does not have to explain the history again at every stage.