About Orlebar Brown
Orlebar Brown is a British luxury brand best known for its tailored swim shorts and elevated holidaywear. With customers across the globe and two major seasonal sales peaks, the brand needed to ensure its replatform from Salesforce Commerce Cloud to Shopify, went unnoticed by the people who matter most — their customers. We spoke with Jamie De Cesare, Orlebar Brown’s CTO, who shared how Digivante’s expert testing team supported the brand’s smooth transition, safeguarded customer experience, and helped deliver the biggest digital project in the company’s history.
“We chose Digivante because we needed experts. We needed speed, discipline, and a partner we could trust to get it right the first time.”
Jamie De Cesare, CTO, Orlebar Brown
The challenge
Most digital teams face a trade-off: move fast or test thoroughly. Jamie had seen it all before. As he said: “This was my eighth big tech project. I’ve got the scars.”
When you’re deep into delivery, testing often becomes compressed, rushed, or overlooked. Worse, when internal teams are responsible for both building and testing, bias creeps in and bugs go unnoticed.
But Orlebar Brown had a clear vision: to launch seamlessly with no disruption to the customer. No broken journeys. No sales drop-off. No surprises.
To do that, they needed a trusted partner who could:
- Plug into their roadmap and delivery plans without slowing anything down.
- Govern QA with structure and clarity.
- Test rapidly, across all devices, without burning out internal resource.
“Normally testing is the area where you get noise and complaints. But with Digivante? Nothing. That says it all.”
Jamie D.
Our solution
Digivante worked hand-in-hand with Orlebar Brown and their development partner Tryzens. We helped shape the QA strategy early and were involved from roadmap alignment through to post-live validation.
Our approach:
- QA Governance: Clear testing plans aligned to sprint cycles and development milestones.
- Crowdtesting at scale: 341 testers across 443 device/browser combinations.
- Cross-browser & exploratory testing: Ensured full coverage across global markets.
- Structured defect reporting: Detailed tickets raised in a format their dev team could act on immediately.
- Pre- and post-go-live testing: Because quality doesn’t stop at launch.
We didn’t just test the software. We protected the brand.
“We could have hired in-house, but why go through that? Digivante were experts from day one. Cost-effective, fast, and focused.”
Jamie D.
The results
• Zero critical issues (P1/P2/P3) at launch.
• Flawless customer transition to the new platform.
• No disruption during peak trading.
• Fully covered device and browser landscape across key markets (UK & US).
• Time and cost savings from avoiding internal resourcing gaps.
What could have been a high-risk replatform became a textbook case of calm, confident delivery.
“It’s rare to finish a project like this and not hear a single complaint. Digivante were a safe pair of hands throughout.”
341
testers on 443 devices
194
issues unearthed
88
days effort delivered in 10 hours
0
critical issues at launch
The takeaway
Most brands think of testing as an afterthought. Or worse, a place to save money.
But Orlebar Brown understood the cost of getting it wrong.
Instead of hiring more staff or stretching their own teams too thin, they brought in a specialist partner who could test at speed, with discipline, and precision. The result? A seamless transition to Shopify, a flawless peak season, and a QA partnership that added value from day one.
“If you’re replatforming and you don’t ringfence budget for testing, you’ll pay for it later. We planned for it, and it paid off.”
Jamie De Cesare, CTO, Orlebar Brown
What’s next for Orlebar Brown & Digivante?
Orlebar Brown are heading into their next peak trading season focused on optimisation, but with next year’s roadmap already taking shape, the partnership is far from over.
Jamie states “You were disciplined. You were collaborative. You were experts. We’ll be working with you again next year — no doubt.”
