About me
Hi, I'm Nikola - most people call me Koko. I'm an independent software engineer based in Bulgaria, and I've been building things on the web for over a decade.
My early career was a mix - I co-founded a small VC-backed hardware startup building a wearable for runners, then worked as a frontend developer on a WooCommerce store selling high-end dinnerware. Useful experience, but neither was where I found my footing.
That came in 2016, when I joined Eastside Co, a Shopify-focused agency. Over two years I shipped more than 50 ecommerce stores for clients of every shape and size. It was the kind of environment where you learn fast, ship faster, and develop a feel for what's pragmatic versus what's over-engineered - lessons I still use every day. It's also where I committed to Shopify as the platform I wanted to build a career around.
In 2018 I joined Huel as a Software Engineer. After two years I was promoted to Senior Software Engineer, and a year later I moved into an independent consultant role through my company Techyon - continuing to work with Huel as the primary client for the next 5 years. In total, 7 years of working with one of the larger DTC brands operating on Shopify Plus.
Huel runs 7 Shopify Plus storefronts, which meant the problems were rarely simple: custom subscription portals, bespoke product configurations and volumetric discounts, headless storefront migration, internal CMS systems for managing the whole multi-store operation, and integrations between Shopify and the surrounding stack of CRMs, ESPs, and internal tools.
Some of the things I'm proud of from that time:
- →Owning the frontend of Huel's bespoke customer portal, used by the entire customer base for managing subscriptions, deliveries, and payments.
- →Bootstrapping and leading the frontend of a centralised CMS that manages products, orders, and content across all 7 Shopify Plus storefronts.
- →Building the proof-of-concept and initial architecture for Huel's headless storefront migration to Next.js and Contentful.
- →Leading the team's transitions from JavaScript to TypeScript, and from Vue to React with Tailwind.
- →Building bespoke product forms with custom volumetric discounting, and a multi-step "build your own bundle" experience used across the product range.
- →Building a Laravel-based integration layer between Shopify and Ometria for transactional emails across all 7 storefronts.
- →Building internal libraries (component libraries, SDKs, config packages) used across the frontend engineering team.
- →Mentoring junior and mid-level developers.
At the end of 2025 I moved on from Huel to focus on independent work full-time. I now work with a small number of DTC brands on the same kind of problems, at a smaller scale - custom Shopify development, theme work, integrations, and fractional senior engineering.
Recent work includes a full theme rebuild on Shopify Online Store 2.0 for Laura Vann, a demi-fine and fine jewellery brand.
Outside of work I'm a proud dad, and I spend most of my non-keyboard time with my family.