--- title: "Designing and launching a PrestaShop shop with AI assistance: a workflow template · Jani Kowalski" description: "A step-by-step template for building a PrestaShop store with Claude Code, read-only MCP access and review gates, from brief to launch and beyond." url: https://procadena.com/notes/prestashop-shop-with-ai-assistance/ language: en updated: 2026-11-05 translations: en: https://procadena.com/notes/prestashop-shop-with-ai-assistance/index.html.md es: https://procadena.com/es/notes/prestashop-shop-with-ai-assistance/index.html.md fr: https://procadena.com/fr/notes/prestashop-shop-with-ai-assistance/index.html.md it: https://procadena.com/it/notes/prestashop-shop-with-ai-assistance/index.html.md pl: https://procadena.com/pl/notes/prestashop-shop-with-ai-assistance/index.html.md --- # Designing and launching a PrestaShop shop with AI assistance: a workflow template A step-by-step template for building a PrestaShop store with Claude Code, read-only MCP access and review gates, from brief to launch and beyond. 5 Nov 2026 · PrestaShop · AI-assisted development · Workflow AI assistants can now write a good share of the code behind an online store. That does not make a store project simpler. It moves the hard part from typing code to deciding what to build, giving the assistant the right context and checking what it produces. This template describes a workflow that keeps those three things under control, from the first brief to the months after launch. It is written for PrestaShop, but most of it applies to any platform. ## 1. Brief and scope Settle the decisions that are expensive to change before any code exists. An assistant will happily build whatever you describe, including the wrong thing. - **Catalogue.** How many products, which attributes and combinations, and where the data comes from. - **Markets.** Countries, currencies, taxes and the carriers each market needs. - **Languages.** Which languages launch first and who checks the translations. - **Version.** Start on PrestaShop 9 with a PHP version that still receives security fixes. Starting on an old version saves a week and costs a migration later. - **Must-have modules.** Payments, shipping, invoicing and anything legally required in your markets. Write the result down as a short document. It becomes the first input for the assistant. ## 2. Set up the AI workspace The assistant is only as good as the context it gets. Prepare that context once, at the start. - **Repository.** Put the theme, custom modules and configuration in Git from day one. - **Project instructions.** A `CLAUDE.md` file at the root explains the store, its conventions, the commands to run and what the assistant must never do. Download the [template](https://procadena.com/downloads/prestashop-CLAUDE.md) and fill it in. ```markdown # CLAUDE.md (excerpt) ## What this is PrestaShop 9 store, PHP maintained. Theme: child of … ## Never - Write to the production database - Commit without the review gates passing ``` - **Read-only access to the store.** An MCP server with read-only access to files and the database lets the assistant check how the store is actually configured instead of guessing. Keep it read-only: changes should reach the store only through reviewed code. - **Privacy.** Customer data must not leave the store unmasked. Use tooling that masks personal data before it reaches the model, or work on an anonymised copy. ## 3. Design Use the assistant to explore, not to decide. - Draft design tokens first: colours, type scale and spacing, with contrast checked for accessibility. - Generate two or three directions for the home page and a product page, then choose one yourself. - Build on a child theme, so updates to the parent theme do not overwrite your work. - Set a performance budget for Core Web Vitals and check it on every template, not only at the end. ## 4. Catalogue and content - Import products from a clean source file rather than typing them in. - Ask the assistant to check the data, not just to load it: missing images, duplicate references, empty descriptions and inconsistent attributes. - Add structured data for products, so search engines and AI assistants can read prices, availability and reviews. - Translate with the assistant, then have every language checked before launch. ## 5. Custom code Most stores need a few custom modules. This is where AI assistance saves the most time, and where review matters most. - Describe one change at a time and keep each change small enough to review. - Ask for tests together with the code. - Run the gates on every change: PHPStan for static analysis, coding-standard security checks and a secret scanner such as gitleaks. - Read the diff yourself. The gates catch classes of mistakes; they do not know your business rules. ## 6. Launch checklist - [ ] Payments tested end to end in live mode, including refunds. - [ ] Taxes, shipping zones and carriers checked for every market. - [ ] Legal pages, cookie handling and accessibility reviewed for your markets. - [ ] Redirects in place for any old URLs, and the sitemap submitted. - [ ] Core Web Vitals measured on mobile for the home, category and product templates. - [ ] Backups configured and one restore tested. - [ ] Monitoring and alerting switched on before the announcement, not after. ## 7. Where people stay in the loop Some decisions should never be delegated to an assistant: - What the store sells, to whom and at what price. - Anything that touches payments, taxes or legal text. - Approving changes to the live store. - Responding to customers about orders and data. > The assistant drafts, checks and explains. A person decides. ## 8. Running the store afterwards A launch is the start of maintenance, not the end of the project. Modules need updates, PHP versions reach end of life and security advisories appear for modules you use. Keep the same workflow after launch: read-only context, small reviewed changes and the same gates. If you maintain several stores, a dashboard such as [nuvols.app](https://nuvols.app) brings monitoring, security advisories, backups and safe updates for all of them into one place.
## Downloads - [`CLAUDE.md` template for a PrestaShop project](https://procadena.com/downloads/prestashop-CLAUDE.md) - [Launch checklist](https://procadena.com/downloads/prestashop-launch-checklist.md)
If you would rather have this workflow applied to your store, you can [hire me on Codeable](https://www.codeable.io/developers/jani-kowalski/). ## Start a project on Codeable A 5.0 rating across 500+ projects, all reviewed publicly. Codeable vetted me before accepting me as an expert and holds your payment in escrow until you approve the work. --- Jani Kowalski · procadena.com Hire: https://www.codeable.io/developers/jani-kowalski/ · Contact: https://procadena.com/hire-us-on-codeable/