OK, it’s over 12 years; I’ve had this post in draft for a while …
It's fitting that my journey with Pimcore has already spanned about 12 years - the same number as Apollo missions, astronauts who walked on the moon, and years the Apollo program ran. But unlike the Apollo program, my Pimcore journey is just getting started. As a true Pimconaut, I've been exploring this versatile platform's capabilities since its early days, watching it evolve from a promising CMS to a recognised force in the digital experience landscape - and my journey is still going strong with innovations on the horizon.
With all of this hype of AI and the innovation it's supposed to bring, it's easy to forget that sometimes just a change of pace, new project, or technological challenge is enough to ignite the same kind of innovation without defaulting to our impending autobot overlords. I've been reflecting recently on the sheer number of projects I've been part of over the years and wanted to share some of the highlights where innovation came from a spark ✨ of inspiration rather than the latest trending technology. I want to demonstrate how creativity and problem-solving with established tools often yield more practical results than constantly chasing the newest shiny object.
The Launch Pad: Early Explorations (2011/12)
My Pimcore journey began in my first job at an agency, whilst developing Magento e-commerce sites. We had a side project launching an iOS app but needed a content management system beyond WordPress. It was here we came across Pimcore, the most “Promising CMS of 2010" (Packt 2010) - we took our first steps into this familiar territory of Zend FW1 (🤮 by today’s standards, no wonder there’s still hate for PHP in 2025!)
Our initial projects focused on app CMS implementations such as:
Airkix indoor sky diving booking and videos
UK-based bars and retail store information apps
A tour guide and game app for Edinburgh Zoo!
Hi-Life Diners Club membership app (which would become a long-term relationship)
Technically, these early implementations involved building what would now be considered a headless CMS approach, connecting Sencha Touch 1 and Phonegap to Pimcore's data structures, and attempting to create a multi-tenancy “Mobile Roadie” platform equivalent for retail.
Achieving Orbit: First Direct Projects (2012-2014)
As I co-founded Gather Digital with Richard, Pimcore became a platform we knew and chose for increasingly ambitious projects:
Paperboat Gallery (2013): Our first direct Pimcore project - perhaps the smallest site ever built on the platform! Though modest in scale, it demonstrated Pimcore's multi-site capabilities through Sites + nginx proxy configuration instead of the more common .htaccess approach. This configuration proved particularly valuable for spinning up hosted Facebook page apps during the era when Facebook allowed embedded content within pages.
Knightstone Properties & Huntersnet (2012-2013): This project showcased Pimcore's power for large-scale data management:
A comprehensive property portal managing inventory from over 100 UK estate agent branches
Processing over 1.5 million image assets through Pimcore's Asset Management
Handling 20,000+ daily property updates through the Pimcore SOAP API and PHP API
Implementing advanced geolocation search using configurable polygon data from the EDINA project, stored as Pimcore Objects
Smart property search based on location name, polygon, postcode polygon and radius
Integrations with Realcube & Zoopla property management platforms
Huntersnet International (2013-2014): This project marked our first multi-lingual implementation and created our first Pimcore plugin - a custom solution for seamlessly translating DataObject data using Microsoft Translate. This was likely the first implementation of its kind, using custom helper functions within views to detect and automatically cache translations within Pimcore's view cache system.
Expanding the Mission: Innovation Years (2014-2017)
These years saw us pushing Pimcore into new frontiers:
Product Partnerships (2014-2018): The first SaaS platform for FCA compliance for car dealerships, featuring what was certainly the first Pimcore instance in the world to use IBCS (International Business Communication Standards) compatible configurable (through code) data visualisations in D3.
Hi-Life Diner's Club (2012-2017): A series of technical milestones featuring:
The first Pimcore instance in the world to use Workflow management and Pimcore v4 in production 😬
The only Pimcore instance to use Gather Digital's proprietary "Data Inspections Manager" was a configurable CRON-based system for building IFTTT-style data query and workflow management. This system solved a critical gap in Pimcore's capabilities at the time: the ability to take data snapshots and monitor changes. For example, it allowed product managers to track the number of transactions per day/week/month and trigger alerts if those numbers changed unexpectedly, providing essential data integrity monitoring across campaigns. (proud of that one!)
The first Pimcore 4 instance to run in Amazon ECS (challenging at the time!)
Lyco Lighting (2016): This Pimcore 4 implementation served as a PIM system for lighting sales and supply with:
Magento store inventory integration
MS Dynamics stock management system integration
Probably the first Pimcore installation to support CSV to ObjectBrick attributes mapping via a fully flexible proprietary accessor/modification DSL (Domain-Specific Language)
APOPO (2016-2017): A Pimcore CMS that literally saved lives! This multi-site CMS and e-commerce solution for sponsoring HeroRATs was the first Pimcore e-commerce installation to support Stripe subscription payment management, featuring multi-currency cross-sell/up-sell subscription functionality.
Breaking New Ground: API-First & Headless (2016-2018)
As the digital landscape evolved, so did our Pimcore implementations:
Manufacturing Source/Cad2Fab (2016): A SaaS prototype featuring:
Entirely React-based frontend with a Pimcore 5 backend/API
API integration with Autodesk 3D modelling viewer
One of the earlier implementations of a completely headless Pimcore setup
NoFilterNeeded (2016): The UK's first, and award-winning "Uber app" for hair stylists, built on Pimcore eCommerce with:
Apple Pay and Stripe integration
Chat-based registration flow
Comprehensive back-of-house booking management and product system
IGT Casino Lounge (2018): A headless Pimcore installation with:
API-first architecture with static frontend
Complex asset management for vendor/partner game assets
Sophisticated API token and access management system
Tractel (2018): A sophisticated multi-lingual PIM and eCommerce site featuring:
Advanced variant management
Elastic search integration
Most likely, it was the first Pimcore installation to support Puppeteer for PDF generation "natively" - a significant technical advancement at the time. While Pimcore offered WKHTMLtoPDF (with restrictive CSS support) or PDFreactor (with licensing and pricing constraints), our puppeteer implementation leveraged freely available headless Chromium technology that provided superior CSS and JavaScript support, dramatically improving the quality and capabilities of PDF generation.
Advanced product variance table generator allowing product managers to select which attributes to pull from the PIM
Automated multi-lingual, multi-variant catalog PDF generation
The Current Mission: Raildiary/Gather Insights (2018-Present)
My most recent major Pimcore project represents the culmination of years of platform knowledge:
Gather Insights (Formerly Raildiary): The leading commercially focused construction record management system:
A SaaS product using Pimcore for configuration and user management
API-first approach with React/ReactNative applications
Direct React-PDF to Pimcore Editable document editor - an innovative solution we developed after discovering scalability limitations with Puppeteer (each Chromium instance consumed approximately 1GB of RAM, making concurrent user scaling challenging). Our React-PDF bridge allows browsers to render PDFs directly while maintaining full compatibility with Pimcore document editables, solving a critical scalability issue while preserving document editing capabilities.
Complex permission systems leveraging Pimcore's user management capabilities
Technical Innovations Along the Way
Throughout these projects, we've pioneered several technical approaches with Pimcore:
Custom Data Flows: Developing proprietary DSLs for data mapping and transformation
Integration Patterns: Connecting Pimcore with everything from payment gateways to 3D modelling tools
Advanced Multi-site Configurations: Using nginx proxy configurations for highly customizcustomisedents
Workflow Automation and Inspections: Implementing custom workflow systems before they became standard features
Headless Implementations: Building API-first architectures on Pimcore's flexible foundation
Cloud Infrastructure: Experimenting with containerisation services for Pimcore deployments
Continuing the Mission: Reflections and Future Directions
Looking back over these 12+ years, Pimcore has proven itself remarkably versatile. From simple CMS implementations to complex PIM systems, multi-lingual e-commerce platforms, and API-first SaaS applications, Pimcore has adapted to each challenge.
It's no surprise to see Pimcore gaining recognition in Gartner's evaluations. Those of us who've been Pimconauts for years have long known its capabilities. While my focus has shifted toward startup ventures in recent years, my passion for the platform and ideas for its evolution continue to grow.
The journey is far from over. With each new project, I continue to discover innovative ways to leverage Pimcore's expanding capabilities. The platform's growing recognition in the industry validates what early adopters like myself have long known - Pimcore offers a uniquely flexible foundation for digital experiences of all kinds.
As Pimcore and my technical explorations continue to evolve, I'm excited to keep pushing boundaries and discovering new possibilities. Here's to the next 12 years of innovation in the Pimcore universe - the mission continues!