Glow & Co. Events
A luxury event & wedding equipment hire platform in the UK Midlands featuring real-time date availability, automated UK postcode delivery calculations, and multi-phase Stripe installment checkouts.
- >Automated UK Postcodes.io geodesic routing engine with Haversine distance pricing
- >Staged 2-phase/3-phase Stripe Elements checkout with automated webhook reconciliation
- >Comprehensive admin booking oversight, refund automation, and S3 media pipeline
Project Vision & Meaning
Glow & Co. Events (DateStocker) was built to modernize luxury event and wedding equipment hire across the UK Midlands. Traditional event hire relies on manual telephone quoting, imprecise delivery estimates, and insecure offline bank transfers. Glow & Co. transforms equipment rental into an automated, boutique e-commerce experience — featuring real-time availability calendars, dynamic multi-tiered rental durations (24h, 48h, 1 week), automated UK postcode distance logistics, and flexible multi-phase Stripe installment plans.
Real-World Problems Solved
Customers can browse luxury inventory (LED dance floors, floral arches, audio/visual setups, chocolate fountains), check real-time date availability, and receive instant UK delivery fee quotes calculated via geospatial postcode mapping. Checkout provides full flexibility with 2-phase (deposit + balance) or 3-phase payment schedules via Stripe Elements. A centralized admin console oversees booking calendars, payment statuses, automated email confirmations, and refund handling.
Challenges & Solutions
Automated UK Postcode Geospatial Logistics & Dynamic Delivery Pricing
Problem Context:Delivering heavy, fragile event equipment across Midlands postcodes requires precise transit pricing based on road distance from the warehouse hub. Manual quote lookup introduces friction and cart abandonment, while static flat rates cause margin losses on distant bookings.
Integrated Postcodes.io API with a server-side Haversine geodesic routing algorithm in Express 5. Outward and full UK postcodes are validated and cached in PostgreSQL, calculating exact mileage and tiered delivery/collection surcharges dynamically before checkout completion.
Multi-Phase Installment Checkout & Stripe Webhook Reconciliation
Problem Context:High-ticket luxury rentals require split payments (initial booking deposit, mid-term installment, final security balance prior to dispatch). Handling staged card charges while preventing inventory double-booking during pending payment windows creates complex race conditions.
Engineered a staged payment state machine backed by Stripe PaymentIntents and webhooks (payment_intent.succeeded, payment_intent.payment_failed, charge.refunded). Pending checkout slots lock inventory for 15 minutes via atomic database transactions, automatically releasing slots on abandonment or confirming installment schedules upon successful authorization.
High-Density Catalog Rendering with Lenis Smooth Scrolling and Radix Primitives
Problem Context:Presenting rich media catalogs with high-res gallery images, animated accordion specs, date pickers, and interactive duration selectors caused frame drops on mobile and touch devices.
Built a hardware-accelerated frontend using Vite, Tailwind CSS v4, and Radix UI headless primitives paired with Lenis virtual smooth scrolling. Product images are lazily loaded with responsive srcsets and CSS contain-intrinsic-size, achieving consistent 60fps scrolling and sub-100ms interaction latency.