Project Status
The Kuhnert Sammel-App has been available for free on the App Store and Google Play since October 2026 (German only). More at app.kuhnert.shop.
The Starting Point: Collecting Without an Overview
Drechslerei Kuhnert, a woodturning workshop in Rothenkirchen in Saxony’s Ore Mountains, has been making wood art since 1986: snowflake children, incense smokers, Stupsi bunnies, owls, moles and much more. In 2026 the business turns 40. Many customers have been collecting the figures for years, often series by series, and pass them on as gifts within the family.
Until now, collectors kept track on paper or in their heads. Which figure from the owl series am I still missing? What’s new? Which dealer near me stocks Kuhnert? And what do I actually want for Christmas? That is what a dedicated app was meant to solve - one that feels like a craft workshop, not like a template.
The App: A Digital Companion for Collectors
The Kuhnert Sammel-App runs on iPhone, iPad and Android and is organised into five areas. Anyone curious can try it as a guest first and sign up later.
Collection
Add figures from the catalogue or simply scan the barcode on the box. For each series the app shows how complete the collection is and what is still missing.
Wishlists
Several lists, top wishes with priority, notes. Share by link, optionally with a password and an expiry date. Fulfilled wishes move straight into the collection.
News
New figures, workshop insights, trade fair dates and Instagram posts in one feed. Push notifications can be switched on and off per topic.
Dealers
All Kuhnert branches and dealers on a map or as a list, with search by town and postcode. Call, get directions or open the web shop right from the app.
Account & Customer Card
Link the existing customer card by scanning it or typing its number and show the barcode at the till - in the app or in Apple Wallet and Google Wallet. Plus settings, customer service, data export and account deletion.
The catalogue holds more than 800 figures from 16 series, from the Annaberg gnomes to the snowflake children. Visually the app follows the Kuhnert identity: deep dark green, lime as a sparing accent, Benguiat serif for headlines. Because many collectors are no longer young, we paid attention to large type, touch targets of at least 44 pixels and clear paths. Anyone who has reduced motion enabled gets no animations.
The Tech Stack: Flutter, Symfony and a Mobile-Ready Admin
The app rests on three building blocks, all of which we developed and operate: the app, an API backend and an admin for the Kuhnert team.
App: Flutter for iOS, Android and Tablets
The app is built with Flutter: one codebase for iPhone, Android and dedicated tablet layouts on iPad and Android tablets. State management runs on Riverpod, navigation on GoRouter, data models on Freezed.
Collection, wishlists and news are stored locally in a SQLite database (Drift). Without reception in a shop, collectors can still look things up and even add figures: changes go into a queue and sync as soon as there is a connection again. Guests use the same mechanism without an account.
Stack: Flutter, Dart, Riverpod, GoRouter, Freezed, Drift, Firebase Cloud Messaging
Backend: Symfony with API Platform
The backend is a Symfony application with API Platform and PostgreSQL. A fast full-text search finds figures even by synonyms the team maintains in the admin.
Heavy lifting runs in the background: syncing with the store, push delivery and image processing. Product images are cropped, cut out and served with a Blurhash preview automatically, so the app never shows empty boxes.
Stack: PHP, Symfony, API Platform, PostgreSQL
Admin: Usable on the iPhone Too
The Kuhnert team often works on the go. That’s why the admin, built with React and TypeScript, works on every page on an iPhone without horizontal scrolling.
This is where news with images and target audiences is created, along with push notifications (immediately, at a set time or tied to an article’s publication), dealers with CSV import and geocoding, legal texts and the design of the wallet cards. An analytics page shows how the app is used. Roles and permissions control who may see and change what, and an audit log records changes.
Stack: React, TypeScript
Integrations: Shopware, Wallet, Instagram, Brevo
Nobody maintains the catalogue twice. Products, categories and customer cards come from Kuhnert’s Shopware store automatically; the app’s series are derived from the category tree automatically.
Customer cards are also available as passes for Apple Wallet and Google Wallet, updated via push. Instagram posts appear in the news feed automatically, and newsletter sign-ups go to Brevo.
Integrations: Shopware 6, Apple Wallet, Google Wallet, Instagram, Brevo, Firebase
Details We’re Proud Of
Most of the work went into things you don’t see at first glance. Four examples:
Gifts Without Spoilers
Friends and family can reserve figures on a shared wishlist or mark them as bought - without an account. Reservations belong to the share link, not to the list, so the owner technically cannot see them.
Pushes That Don’t Annoy
When the status of a wished-for figure changes, for example because it will soon be discontinued, only people who have it on their wishlist hear about it. Several changes are bundled into one message and sent in the morning at the hour with the most app activity, not at night right after the store sync. Before that they sit in the admin, where the team can still edit or stop them.
App Icons From the Backend
Users can choose between several icons, from owls and snowflake children to the anniversary icon for 40 years of Kuhnert. The team can also roll out an icon centrally, immediately or on a schedule, say for Christmas - optionally only on devices where nobody has picked an icon themselves.
Privacy-Aware Analytics
Admin analytics only show groups of 15 people or more. In small towns, membership of a dealer’s customer group could otherwise point to individuals. The threshold is stated in the privacy policy as well.
Quality: Tested Before It Goes Live
An app in the stores can’t be patched after the fact the way a website can. That’s why we invested heavily in tests and automation:
- âś“ More than 700 test files across app, API and admin
- âś“ Golden tests that compare screens pixel by pixel, including with large system fonts
- âś“ End-to-end tests with Maestro (app) and Playwright (admin)
- âś“ Static analysis with PHPStan and the Dart analyzer in every pipeline
- âś“ Automated security scans and a software bill of materials (SBOM) for the Cyber Resilience Act
- âś“ Automatic dependency updates with Renovate
Merge requests with a red pipeline cannot be merged. We notice errors in production before users report them, and any release can be rolled back quickly if needed.
Co-Funded by the European Union
Drechslerei Kuhnert received funding for the project from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) through the Sächsische Aufbaubank, under the “Förderrichtlinie Digitalisierung Zuschuss EFRE 2021 bis 2027” programme. For businesses in Saxony it can pay off to look into such programmes before starting a digital project.
Conclusion: Craft and Technology Go Together
The Kuhnert Sammel-App shows that a craft business from the Ore Mountains can offer its customers an app that holds its own against big brands. The key was not to treat the app in isolation: it is connected to the existing store, the team maintains it on its own, and privacy and accessibility were part of the plan from the start. Four months after we were commissioned the app was finished, and since October it has been in both stores - and the next features are already in the works.
You’ll find all the details in our project overview.
Thinking about offering your customers an app of your own? Get in touch - we’re happy to advise, including on funding options.