We didn’t start DYODE to run an agency.
It came from 20+ years our co-founders Tim and George Mikhail spent as VPs of ecom on the brand side of enterprise retail.
Wondering about the name? What does DYODE mean? →
Our Origin
They learned the work where it actually happens, at the complex intersection of merchandising, marketing, technology, finance, and brick & mortar.
Every initiative had downstream effects. Every platform choice had political implications. Every roadmap decision required trade-offs someone would own long after the project shipped.
Built by Operators, Not Career Agency People
DYODE was built by senior eCommerce operators with experience leading and advising major retail, lifestyle, apparel, beauty, gaming, footwear, and consumer brands. We are an Orange County-based Shopify Plus agency serving brands across Southern California, the U.S., and worldwide.
Before founding DYODE, Tim Katz held senior eCommerce and marketing leadership roles at PacSun, Rakuten, and Active Ride Shop. George Mikhail brought senior eCommerce leadership experience from Tilly’s and GUESS?. During DYODE’s early formation, our leadership also consulted for brands including Algenist, J!NX, Sole Technology, La Jolla Group, Hudson Jeans, and Tadashi Shoji.
That operator background shapes how we work. We do not approach eCommerce as a list of disconnected deliverables. We think through revenue, operations, merchandising, UX, conversion, acquisition, retention, and the real business impact behind every decision.
PacSun, Rakuten, Active Ride Shop, Tilly’s, GUESS?
Algenist, J!NX, Sole Technology, La Jolla Group, Hudson Jeans, Tadashi Shoji
Brands grouped by relationship type. Leadership and consulting experience predates DYODE and does not imply current client status.
The operators behind DYODE
Two co-founders with two decades of brand-side eCommerce leadership before building DYODE.
Tim Katz
Before founding DYODE, Tim held senior eCommerce and marketing leadership roles at PacSun, Rakuten, and Active Ride Shop. He also consulted for brands including Algenist, J!NX, and Sole Technology, the parent company behind Etnies, Emerica, éS, and ThirtyTwo.
George Mikhail
Before DYODE, George Mikhail held senior eCommerce leadership roles at Tilly’s and GUESS?, and consulted for brands including La Jolla Group, Hudson Jeans, and Tadashi Shoji.
Built as an anti-agency
Not as a posture, but as a reflection of how retail leaders actually think.
We approach client problems the way we did on the brand side: by understanding constraints, pressure-testing assumptions, and aligning decisions to business reality rather than decks or deliverables.
We don’t take orders and disappear. That’s not what we would have wanted from a partner, and it’s not what we offer.
How We Actually Work
We audit a brand’s current state, prioritize opportunities by impact and risk, and carry work forward with the same accountability we once had when those outcomes sat on our own P&Ls.
How we see AI shaping commerce
For a long time, the standard business tradeoff held: fast, cheap, or good. Pick two. You could have any two, but never all three.
Speed, cost, and quality can all improve at the same time. That’s a structural change in how work gets done between brands and agencies. But AI doesn’t deliver those outcomes on its own. It amplifies the work it’s applied to, which means the judgment about where and how to use it matters as much as the capability itself.
Applied to the right places (high-volume, repetitive, time-consuming work), it frees teams to focus where brands actually want value: strategy, tradeoffs, quality oversight, and judgment calls that require brand nuance.
Awareness of AI isn’t the same as knowing how to use it. Most teams adopt tools without a clear view of which parts of their operation those tools should touch, or what the right sequencing looks like.
The fundamentals never left
The work we were doing years ago on the brand side still defines ecommerce today. Revenue flows from clear merchandising, disciplined execution, and teams that understand how decisions ripple across the company.
As brands scale, fundamentals don’t disappear. They get harder to manage. Systems multiply, stakeholders increase, interdependencies deepen, and new tools arrive faster than most teams can absorb them.
Each layer introduces complexity that demands judgment, sequencing, and restraint.
Where we see commerce going
The next era will reward teams that exercise judgment under pressure. The advantage will belong to brands that know how to integrate change without destabilizing what already works: fewer, better decisions made with clarity about timing, risk, and downstream impact.
Toward Judgment, Away From Tools
Platforms commoditize. The advantage shifts to teams who know what to do, when, and why.
Toward Composable, Away From Replatforming
Brands will adopt change in layers, adding capability through best-in-class technology partners without breaking what already works.
Toward Conviction, Away From Velocity
Speed without clarity creates rework. The next era rewards fewer, sharper decisions.
Toward Outcomes, Away From Output
Activity stops counting as progress. Work will be measured by what it changes for the business.
DYODE exists to help brands navigate that reality.
If you’re navigating these pressures now, we should talk.
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