Johnson Outdoors – All the Outdoors Under One Digital Roof

For decades, Johnson Outdoors was known for adventure—kayaks, fishing gear, dive equipment, and more. Their gear took people across oceans, mountains, and forests—but their digital experience? That was another story.

Six different brands.
Six different websites.
Six different checkout experiences.

For customers, shopping felt like a maze, rather than a seamless adventure. They’d fill a cart on one site—only to realize they needed something from another, forcing them to start over, re-enter payment details, and navigate multiple checkout systems.

It was frustrating for customers and inefficient for the business.

The mission was clear: Unify six e-commerce sites into a single, smooth shopping experience.

But like any great adventure, the path wasn’t easy.

The Journey: Breaking Down the Barriers
As Associate Director of QA at Digitas, I was responsible for ensuring this massive transformation worked flawlessly—for the customers, for Johnson Outdoors, and for the future scalability of their business.

🛠 The Big-Picture Fix (Outside View):
✅ Merging six sites into one platform for better efficiency, lower maintenance, and stronger performance.
✅ Creating a unified shopping cart so customers could check out once, regardless of which brands they shopped from.
✅ Performance testing the new infrastructure to ensure a seamless user experience, even during high-traffic sales periods.

🔎 The Small-Scale Fixes (Inside View):
✔️ Fixing tiny inconsistencies in checkout flows that could make or break a purchase.
✔️ Ensuring product recommendations worked across brands—so if someone was buying a kayak, they’d see Johnson Outdoors’ best paddle gear, not just that brand’s accessories.
✔️ Aligning six different business teams—each with their own workflows, goals, and expectations—into one streamlined process.

This wasn’t just an IT project.
It was an adventure in restructuring an entire digital shopping ecosystem.

The Obstacles: Challenges That Became Lessons
💡 Load Testing Exposed Hidden Bottlenecks
Before launch, we used JMeter and BlazeMeter to simulate peak shopping traffic. And it’s a good thing we did—because early tests revealed slowdowns at checkout.

Without proactive testing, this issue would have led to abandoned carts and frustrated customers. Instead, we optimized performance before launch, not after.

💡 Aligning Six Business Teams Wasn’t Easy
Each brand had its own legacy processes, concerns, and workflows. We had to ensure that the new system worked for everyone—from finance teams to customer service reps.

By leading structured UAT testing, I helped business stakeholders:
✔️ Understand how the new platform worked
✔️ Test and approve functionality before launch
✔️ Feel confident in the transition, not overwhelmed by it

💡 Merging Six Payment Gateways Introduced Unexpected Issues
On the surface, merging six checkout systems looked like a simple migration. But the reality? Each brand had slightly different rules for taxes, shipping, and promotions.

A minor inconsistency in pricing calculations could have cost Johnson Outdoors thousands in lost revenue.

Through extensive functional testing and transaction validation, we caught these errors early and ensured a flawless, frustration-free checkout experience.

The Triumph: A Frictionless Shopping Experience
🛒 Seamless Multi-Brand Shopping – Customers could now browse, add items from multiple brands to a single cart, and check out in one transaction.
🚀 Optimized Performance & Reliability – Load testing ensured zero slowdowns even during peak Black Friday sales.
📈 Streamlined Business Operations – Unifying platforms cut down maintenance costs and improved internal workflows.
🔍 Flawless UAT Execution – Stakeholders had confidence in the system before launch, thanks to structured testing and training.

Johnson Outdoors didn’t just upgrade their e-commerce system—they future-proofed their business.

Why This Project Stands Out
Every great adventure has an obstacle to overcome, a puzzle to solve, and a lesson learned.

✔️ This wasn’t just about testing a website—it was about ensuring that a complex digital transformation didn’t become a disaster.
✔️ It proved that small technical details make a massive difference in how customers experience a brand.
✔️ And it reinforced that QA isn’t just about testing—it’s about ensuring technology enables growth, not barriers.

By the time we launched, customers never saw the work that went into making their shopping experience seamless.

And that’s exactly how it should be.