With invoice purchase, 0% financing, and Unzer's checkout booster app, Sushi Bikes solved this problem — and in doing so not only significantly improved conversion, but also completely eliminated payment defaults and boosted bike sales by around 30 percent.

Sushi Bikes in profile

Sushi Bikes is a German direct-to-consumer (D2C) company in the premium e-bike segment. With a clear focus on design, quality, and brand experience, Sushi Bikes sells its e-bikes directly to customers—mostly through its own online shop built on Shopify.

The main model falls in the price range between 1,000 and 2,000 euros. About three-quarters of the traffic comes from smartphones. For a small, agile team, operational efficiency is just as important as a great customer experience — from the first click to checkout.

The challange

60 percent checkout abandonments in high-priced D2C

Sushi Bikes faced a clear challenge: around 60 percent of the sessions that reached the checkout ended without a purchase. With an average bike price of over 1,100 euros for the main model, each of these drop-offs was costly.

From support requests and my own observations, it quickly became clear what the issue was: customers who buy an e-bike for 1,500 euros don't want to pay upfront. They want to see the bike first — and then pay.

At a €30 order value, it is less critical whose logo appears in checkout. At €1,500, it matters. When someone buys a bike from us, they should see SUSHI in checkout — not ‘powered by’ someone else. With Unzer, we achieved exactly that: a consistent brand experience, true invoice payments, and a payment guarantee that takes a huge operational burden off our team.

Andy Weinzierl, CEO, Sushi Bikes

Especially in e-commerce, it's clear that buying on invoice isn't the same for everyone. Different target groups have different expectations when it comes to payment methods, brand management, and the checkout experience. That's why an additional BNPL solution can be crucial for reaching more customer segments and making better use of conversion potential.

The motives:

Why Sushi Bikes chose Unzer

With a purchase price of 1,500 euros, trust in the brand is crucial. If someone buys a BikeRad from Sushi Bikes, they should see SUSHI Bike throughout the checkout — not 'powered by XY.' Unzer's white-label approach makes exactly that possible: a consistent brand experience right up to the last step of the payment process.

Inhouse BNPL wasn’t an option for Sushi Bikes. Tying up working capital in open receivables and setting up a collections process in the D2C business was neither scalable nor desirable. With secured white-label BNPL from Unzer, Unzer completely takes on the risk; Sushi Bikes gets the payment guaranteed.

The official Shopify apps from Unzer cover invoice purchases, installment payments, and many other relevant payment methods, all without custom source code or in-house development. For a small team, that's a big deal. Direct technical contacts from Unzer also help out with testing.

The solution

Shopify Payment Apps from Unzer

Sushi Bikes uses various payment apps from Unzer from the Shopify App Store, including Invoice, Instalment, Cards, and Wero. The implementation was basically handled by CEO Andy Weinzierl himself, with support from a commercial and technical contact from Unzer.

• Invoice purchase in the look & feel of Sushi Bikes
• Buy on installments with 0% financing for consumers

An overview of the key levers of the solution:

The solution is set up as an additional payment option and specifically expands the existing payment mix. This way, Bergzeit can better reach customers with different payment preferences and offer more flexibility at checkout.

• White-label invoice payments within the Sushi Bikes brand environment
• Installment payments as an additional BNPL option for higher-value purchases
• Parallel setup of Shopify Payments, PayPal, and Unzer in checkout
• Mobile-optimized user experience, critical for a smartphone-heavy traffic mix
• Payment guarantee through Secured Payments, eliminating default risk for Sushi Bikes
• Unzer Checkout Booster App on product and cart pages, making invoice and installment options visible before checkout
• Automatic sync of captures, refunds, and cancellations between Shopify and Unzer

The Go-Live

Just a few minutes from setup to go-live

The implementation went quickly and smoothly. Thanks to Unzer's official Shopify plugin, no custom code was needed. The whole process—from installing the plugin to the test cases to preparing for go-live—took 45 minutes.

What was especially valuable for Sushi Bikes was the direct support from Unzer contacts during testing. For a small team without dedicated payment resources, that made a noticeable difference.

The checkout was set up so that Shopify Payments, PayPal, and Unzer are all available side by side. Customers can pick the payment method that works best for them in the moment — no interruptions, no detours, with a consistently smooth mobile UX.

Payment Messaging: Make invoice purchase and installment payment visible even before checkout

In addition to the checkout apps, Sushi Bikes uses another Unzer app that creates a crucial extra leverage: payment messaging directly on product and cart pages.

The widget already shows customers on the product page and in the cart that buying on invoice and in installments is available—even before they even reach the checkout. Especially in the high-priced D2C segment, this is an effective way to lower the psychological barrier early on and reduce hesitation to buy.

For Sushi Bikes, this means concretely: Anyone looking at an e-bike for 1,500 euros on the product page can immediately see that they can conveniently pay by invoice or in installments—without having to go through the checkout first to get this information. This exact moment is crucial for conversion.

The result:

+30 percent bike sales, 44 percent of revenue through Unzer

Since going live, there have been different results compared to the previous branded invoice purchase solution.

An additional benefit came up in day-to-day operations: a digital exchange space was created for customer service, which makes handling specific payment cases much easier and faster. On top of that, another payment-specific exchange space is planned to further expand collaboration in the long run.

At SUSHI BIKES, we can clearly see how payment methods affect conversion. Letting customers calculate their installments right on the product page under 'Add-to-cart' creates transparency exactly at the moment the buying decision is made — and that directly shows up in our conversion rate.

Andy Weinzierl, Geschäftsführer Sushi Bikes

Conclusion: Paying by invoice and installment purchases as an important part of the BNPL mix

Since going live, clear, measurable effects are showing — both compared to last year's numbers and in week-to-week comparison, clear, measurable effects.

• | Checkout abandonment rate | -5 percentage points
• | Overall conversion rate | +about 25 percent |
• | Total bike sales | +approx. 30 percent |
• | Revenue share via Unzer | around 44 percent of total bike revenue |