★ Six generations of the same family · Plymouth + Kingsbridge · since 1887

137 years. Six generations. A homepage that finally says so.

A free, fully built proposal site for Wray & Co, the Plymouth and Kingsbridge family jeweller founded 1887 by William G Capps and now run by Andrew Statton Snr (fifth generation) and Andrew Statton Jnr (sixth). Three findings below, then a working homepage rebuild at /preview/ you can click through.

Open live preview ↗ Read the three findings Reply to the proposal

Plymouth
102 New George Street, Plymouth PL1 1RZ Kingsbridge
51 Fore Street, Kingsbridge, Devon TQ7 1PG Founded 1887 Principals Andrew Statton Snr and Andrew Statton Jnr

Andrew Statton Snr outside 102 New George Street, Plymouth, the Wray & Co flagship

102 New George Street · Plymouth PL1 1RZ · since 1887

Six generations of the same family on the Plymouth counter. Open the live preview ↗

Three findings, in order of revenue impact

What the current site is leaving on the table.

A walk-through of the live wraysjewellers.co.uk on 18 May 2026.

01

Six generations, 137 years. None of it lives on the homepage.

Observation: wraysjewellers.co.uk opens to a product grid. There is no founder name, no succession story, no Plymouth address, no Kingsbridge address. A first-time visitor cannot tell who runs the shop, where the counter is, or whether the business is one year old or one hundred. The six-generation lineage from William G Capps in 1887 through Reginald, Bettie & Herbert, Richard, Andrew Snr and Andrew Jnr is the strongest single asset Wray & Co holds, and it is hidden two clicks deep behind a footer link labelled "Our 137 Year History".
Revenue impact: A customer choosing between Wray & Co and a high-street chain for an antique ring, an inherited valuation or a wedding band decides on craft credibility in the first scroll. "Same family, Plymouth and Kingsbridge, since 1887" is the line that wins that decision. It is the line the homepage does not say.
Cause: The Shopify theme places product collections first and editorial second. The Gem Pages page-builder used for the history page does not feed the home template, so the 6-generation story exists in one corner of the site that no first-time visitor reaches.
After rebuild: The rebuild leads with a six-generation portrait wall in the hero, names every generation by name, and pins both Plymouth and Kingsbridge addresses above the fold.

02

137 years in one paragraph. 136 years in the next. 135 in the og:description.

Observation: The history page shows two h2 headings back to back: "136 years and counting..." then "137 years..." (with the same body text under both). The og:description on the same page reads "For over 135 years, we have been serving the people of Plymouth and surrounding areas." Three different ages on one website. A customer reading carefully can see that the site has not been edited for at least a year, and assumes the rest of the content is also stale.
Revenue impact: Three different ages on one site reads as the site being abandoned by the people running the shop. The exact opposite of what 137 years of unbroken family trading wants to communicate.
Cause: The Gem Pages editor was used to draft the history page in 2023 ("136 years..."), partially updated in 2024 ("137 years...") and the og:description was never touched ("over 135 years"). Without a single foundingDate field, every reference to age is a hand-typed string that will keep drifting.
After rebuild: The rebuild keeps the founding year in one place. Every age string ("137 years on the Plymouth counter") is derived from foundingDate at build time. Next January it self-updates to 138. The same number appears in the meta description, the og:description, and the JSON-LD.

03

"Will be gradually phased on to the site". An unfinished launch sits on the homepage.

Observation: A paragraph on the homepage reads: "All of our Jewellery from both of our stores will be gradually phased on to the site." It sits alongside a separate "brand new website" line in the same scroll. A customer reading it understands two things at once: the site is incomplete, and the people running it know it is incomplete.
Revenue impact: A jeweller selling £500 inherited rings and £2,000 bespoke wedding sets needs trust on the homepage. "Will be gradually phased on" reads as "do not bother browsing", which sends the customer to a competitor that committed to launching.
Cause: Shopify treats every product as an inventory row. Wray & Co has 137 years of antique stock that has never been catalogued, so the rebuild was launched with a placeholder. The placeholder never came down.
After rebuild: The rebuild leads with what Wray & Co actually does in the shop today (six generations, antique counter, watchmaking, in-house engraving, bespoke wedding rings, valuations) and treats the e-commerce catalogue as a secondary surface, not the homepage. The "phased on" line goes.

Web stack and gaps, May 2026

From a Shopify storefront with editorial bolted on, to a proper one-page site for the shop.

Current ↗ wraysjewellers.co.uk

Platform: Shopify (with Gem Pages page-builder)
Hosting: Shopify Basic, around £29/month, plus Gem Pages add-on
Editorial: History and contact pages built in Gem Pages, separate from the Liquid theme
Fonts: Six Google Fonts families requested in full weight ranges (Amethysta, Playfair, Corinthia, Abril Fatface, Calligraffitti, Noto Serif Khojki)
Schema: No LocalBusiness, no JewelryStore, no Person, no FAQPage, no foundingDate
Imagery: Uploadcare CDN images served at 3000x3000 with no responsive sizing
Heritage: "136 years" and "137 years" headings on the same page; "over 135 years" in the og:description

Proposed

Framework: Astro static site (Astro 6)
Hosting: Vercel edge network, sub-100ms first-byte across the UK
Editorial: Six-generation hero, two-branch visit block, JSON-LD JewelryStore + FAQPage built at compile time
Fonts: Three faces only (Cormorant Garamond, Inter, JetBrains Mono), discrete weights, no opsz axis
Schema: JewelryStore with two LocalBusiness branches (Plymouth + Kingsbridge), foundingDate 1887, founder Person, six member Persons, FAQPage
Imagery: Responsive srcset, real photos sized for the device, no 3000x3000 payloads
Heritage: foundingDate 1887 generates "137 years" everywhere. The 138-year update next January is automatic.

Three-week build plan

Kick-off to live in three weeks.

Week 1

Six-generation portrait hero with all six names
Two-branch visit block (Plymouth flagship + Kingsbridge)
Founding-year strip, with the 1887 to 2026 number derived once and used everywhere

Week 2

Antique counter, watchmaking, bespoke wedding rings, valuations service block
Hours block with the Sunday and bank-holiday closure made explicit
Real product photography on responsive srcset, no 3000x3000 page-builder bloat

Week 3

JewelryStore + two LocalBusiness branches + Person + FAQPage schema
DNS cutover, Shopify storefront pointed at the new pages, analytics enabled
Six-generation print-out for the Plymouth counter, same artwork as the homepage hero

Pricing

Fixed price. No retainer. No hourly billing.

No retainer. No contract. No in-person visits, the build runs fully remote from Switzerland.

Build

Full Astro rebuild + schema

Six-generation hero, two-branch visit block (Plymouth + Kingsbridge), antique counter, watchmaking, bespoke, repairs and valuations service grid, hours block, JewelryStore + two LocalBusiness branches + Person + FAQPage schema, contact form.

£2,000

one-off, fixed

Care

Monthly hosting and ongoing care

Vercel hosting, schema kept current, monthly content tweaks, security updates, monthly analytics email, one editorial change per month included.

£150/mo

cancel any time

Optional

Embedded FAQ chatbot

Trained on the FAQ, the services page and the six-generation history. Handles after-hours enquiries about valuations, watch repairs, opening hours and Kingsbridge appointments.

£50/mo

add or drop

• One round of revisions before launch

• DNS cutover handled (you keep the domain)

• 30 days of post-launch tweaks at no extra cost

• Source code handed over on day 60

Frequently asked

Five things worth answering before you reply.

What happens to the Shopify store and the existing product catalogue?

The Shopify storefront stays for the inventory side. The new site sits at wraysjewellers.co.uk and handles everything a first-time visitor reaches for: the six-generation story, both shop locations, hours, services, valuations, watch repairs, contact. Existing Shopify product URLs redirect through. No customer reaches the "will be gradually phased on" admission ever again, because the homepage no longer asks them to.

The hero you describe rests on family portraits. Are we comfortable surfacing them?

The portraits of William, Reginald, Bettie and Herbert, Richard, Andrew Snr and Andrew Jnr are already on /pages/our-history on the live site. The rebuild moves them to where they earn their keep, the homepage hero, and labels each one by name and generation. The walk-by customer sees what the inside of the shop already says: six generations of the same family running the counter.

How does the two-branch story work without crowding the page?

Two visit cards, stacked on mobile, side by side on desktop. Plymouth flagship at 102 New George Street with Andrew Snr outside the shop. Kingsbridge at 51 Fore Street with Andrew Jnr outside. Each card carries its own phone, hours and Google Maps embed. Both are tied back to the same six-generation hero at the top of the page so the reader understands they are one family across two shops, not two unrelated jewellers.

Why is the watchmaking line worth surfacing on the homepage?

Because William G Capps was a watchmaker before he was a jeweller. He served his apprenticeship as a watchmaker from the 1860s and only opened the jewellery shop in 1887. The watchmaking craft is older than the shop itself. Customers in Plymouth and Kingsbridge looking for a battery, a strap or a service tend to drive to a chain. They should drive to Wray & Co, and the homepage should say so.

Six generations of jewellers. How does that compete with the chains on Plymouth search?

It does not compete on marketing budget. It competes on the queries the chains cannot answer convincingly. "Antique jeweller Plymouth", "jeweller Kingsbridge Fore Street", "family jeweller Devon since 1887", "valuation jeweller Plymouth", "watch repair Plymouth New George Street". With JewelryStore + two LocalBusiness branches + Person + FAQPage schema, those long-tail queries route to Wray & Co, not to the H Samuel branch at Drake Circus.

Next step

If the proposal lands.

Reply with two or three 20-minute slots in the next ten days for a video call. I take on three Devon builds this quarter, and first confirmed wins the slot. If I do not hear back by 28 May 2026, the proposal site comes down.

Reply to the proposal Open live preview ↗

See the rebuild

A working preview you can click through.

Opens in this tab. Six generations on the homepage. Both shops above the fold. JewelryStore schema. No "phased on to the site".

Open live preview ↗