A storefront's look is the first thing a shopper judges, and on a platform like BigCommerce the template you choose sets the ceiling for both that first impression and the conversion rate that follows. At 1Digital Agency we build custom BigCommerce templates that give a store a bespoke look without the bespoke price tag. Below we showcase five of our favorite designs — but more usefully, we explain what makes each one work, so you can evaluate any template (ours or otherwise) against the things that actually drive sales rather than just picking the prettiest screenshot.
What actually makes a BigCommerce template "good"
Before the showcase, the criteria. A template earns its place by being responsive and fast on mobile first (where most traffic and Google's primary index are), by guiding the eye toward the product and the add-to-cart, by suiting your catalog's size and structure, and by being customizable and maintained. A beautiful homepage that buries the buy button or loads slowly on a phone is a worse template than a plainer one that converts. Read each design below through that lens.
Five designs and why they work
Sanders — a minimalist frame that lets the products carry the page, with small, deliberate splashes of color reserved for navigation and calls to action. This works because restraint directs attention: when almost everything is neutral, the few colored elements (the cart, the buy button) become impossible to miss. Best for stores whose product photography is strong enough to stand on its own.
Azzimato — an upscale, old-world feel built from a long serif typeface and considered details (even renaming "my cart" to "my bag"). The lesson here is that microcopy and type are brand signals; a luxury buyer reads "polished" or "generic" from these cues before reading a word of product copy. Best for premium and considered-purchase catalogs.
Larsen — keeps an elevated aesthetic but grounds it with earth tones and a modern face, reading as high-quality-but-usable rather than precious. Good for brands whose products are premium yet meant for everyday use, where the design has to signal both quality and approachability.
Industire — a gallery-style, image-forward layout that treats the homepage like an exhibition. It works only when product photography is genuinely excellent, because the design deliberately gets out of the way and lets images do the selling. Choose it when your imagery is a competitive advantage, not a placeholder.
Luxe — a bold, high-contrast red-and-black scheme engineered to push momentum straight toward checkout with minimal distraction. It demonstrates a real principle: a tightly focused path with few competing elements can lift conversion for stores with a clear, fast-decision product. Use it when the goal is decisive action, not extended browsing.
The principle behind all five
Look across Sanders, Azzimato, Larsen, Industire, and Luxe and a single idea connects them: each one makes a deliberate choice about where the shopper's attention goes and removes everything that competes with it. Minimalism, luxury typography, earth-toned warmth, gallery imagery, and high-contrast urgency are different means to the same end — directing a specific kind of buyer toward a specific decision without friction. That is the real lesson for evaluating any template, not just ours: a design is not "good" because it is beautiful; it is good because it subordinates everything on the page to the one action you want the shopper to take next. Themes fail commercially when they try to be impressive in several directions at once — a busy hero, competing banners, decorative elements that pull the eye away from the product and the buy button. When you assess a candidate template, ask what it is willing to leave out. The disciplined ones convert; the ones trying to show off everything rarely do. This is also why the "right" template is store-specific: the attention choice that suits a curated boutique (Industire's gallery restraint) actively hurts a high-velocity, decisive-purchase store that needs Luxe's straight line to checkout, and vice versa. Choosing well means knowing your buyer's decision style first, then picking the design whose deliberate omissions match it.
How to choose among them (or any template)
- Start from your catalog and buyer. Match the layout to how many products you sell and how customers decide — an image-led gallery theme suits a curated boutique, not a 5,000-SKU parts store that needs robust filtering.
- Check mobile and speed first. Test the demo on a phone and run a page-speed check before judging the desktop hero.
- Find the buy button. If the path to add-to-cart and checkout is not obvious within seconds, the design is working against you no matter how striking it is.
- Plan the customization. Decide what must change to fit your brand and confirm it is achievable without fighting the theme.
Turning a template choice into a conversion decision
The reason design criteria matter so much is arithmetic. Store revenue is, roughly, traffic times conversion rate times average order value. A template influences two of those three directly: conversion rate (through clarity of the product page, prominence of the call to action, trust signals, and speed) and, indirectly, average order value (through how well it surfaces related products, bundles, and upsells). A template chosen purely on homepage aesthetics optimizes none of these; a template chosen on the criteria above moves the two levers that compound across every visitor for the life of the store. That is why "which template looks nicest" is the wrong question and "which template best guides my specific buyer from landing to checkout" is the right one. Each of the five designs above answers that question for a different kind of catalog — the skill is matching the design's strengths to how your customers actually decide, then validating the choice with real post-launch analytics rather than assuming.
Frequently asked questions
Is a custom template better than a stock BigCommerce theme? A custom or customized template differentiates you from competitors using the same stock theme and can be tuned to your catalog and conversion path. A well-built stock theme is fine to launch on; customize or go custom when differentiation or functionality justifies it.
Will a new template hurt my SEO? A template change alters presentation, not URLs, so it is low-risk provided you preserve URL structure, metadata, structured data, and content through the redesign.
How do I know if a design will convert? Judge it by product-page clarity, add-to-cart prominence, mobile performance, and trust signals — not by homepage aesthetics alone. Then validate with real analytics after launch.
What if none of these fit? Then a from-scratch build is the answer — the point of a template is speed and value, and if it cannot serve your brand and catalog, it is the wrong tool.
Whether you are opening a new store or refreshing an old one, our BigCommerce designers can tailor a template to your products, and if total customization is what your vision requires, our BigCommerce developers can build a store from the ground up. Contact us for an expert opinion on designing your ecommerce website.