Senior Principal Software Engineer

Shutterfly, Inc.; Durham (NC); Remote; USD 150,000 - 206,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Bonus incentive

Health benefits

401K program

Other employee perks

Job summary

Spoonflower, part of the Shutterfly family, seeks a Senior Principal Software Engineer to lead backend systems and API design powering our commerce experiences. You will own GraphQL services, federated architectures, and Shopify integrations, partnering across teams to deliver scalable solutions and reliable systems.

You will drive architectural decisions, mentor engineers, and influence the roadmap while ensuring performance and uptime in a remote-friendly environment.

Qualifications

• 8+ years of backend or platform engineering experience.
• Strong track record building distributed systems and APIs at scale.
• Deep proficiency with GraphQL design, including federation architectures.
• Experience with Shopify or similar ecommerce platforms.
• Strong experience with Node.js and TypeScript.
• Proven ownership of systems in production (performance, uptime, reliability).
• Ability to work independently and drive high-impact work to completion.
• Excellent communication of tradeoffs and system design decisions.

Responsibilities

• Own design and evolution of core backend services and APIs supporting commerce workflows.
• Lead architecture and implementation of GraphQL services on Apollo Federation supergraph.
• Build and improve Shopify integrations as part of cross-team effort.
• Reconcile Shopify inventory/SKU with made-to-order fulfillment flow and order lifecycle.
• Define and improve service boundaries, data models, and integration points.
• Partner with frontend, product, and platform teams to simplify development and integration.
• Diagnose and resolve deep distributed-systems and runtime-level failures.
• Own production systems, including observability and incident response.
• Act as a technical reference in design reviews, mentoring, and coding standards.
• Influence roadmap decisions with clear tradeoffs grounded in business impact.

Skills

Backend engineering

Distributed systems

GraphQL design

Apollo Federation

Shopify integrations

Node.js/TypeScript

Production incident management

Technical leadership

Job description

At Spoonflower (part of the Shutterfly family of brands) our mission is to empower your vision by helping you discover the perfect design for you and your print on wallpaper, fabric, or home decor. Spoonflower connects independent artists worldwide who create designs with consumers, makers, and interior designers looking for unique designs and products that are right for their projects.

Spoonflower is evolving its eCommerce platform into a modern, service-oriented architecture supporting a global, made-to-order retail environment. We are hiring a Senior Principal Software Engineerto drive the design and evolution of core backend systems powering our commerce experience. This role reports directly to the Director of Engineering and is for a deeply technical engineer who takes hands-on ownership of major platform areas while partnering closely with other engineers and teams. You will be a key contributor to scaling our platform through Shopify integrations, GraphQL federation, and service-based systems.

What You'll Do Here:

• Own the design and evolution of core backend services and APIs supporting commerce workflows
• Lead architecture and implementation of GraphQL services on our Apollo Federation supergraph
• Build and improve Shopify integrations (Storefront API, Admin API, webhooks, order lifecycle) as part of a cross-team effort
• Reconcile Shopify's inventory-and-SKU commerce model with our made-to-order, print-on-demand fulfillment flow, where the order lifecycle is the hard problem
• Define and improve service boundaries, data models, and integration points across systems
• Partner with frontend, product, and platform teams to simplify how teams build and integrate
• Diagnose and resolve deep distributed-systems and runtime-level failures, including federation transport behavior, connection-pool issues, and event-loop performance under load
• Own production systems, including operability, observability, and incident response
• Act as a technical reference point through design reviews, mentoring, and setting engineering standards
• Influence roadmap decisions by providing clear tradeoffs grounded in business and system impact

The Skills You'll Bring:

• 8+ years of experience in backend or platform engineering
• Strong experience building and operating distributed systems and APIs at scale
• Deep proficiency in GraphQL design and implementation, including federated/supergraph architectures
• Experience with Shopify or similar eCommerce platforms
• Strong experience with Node.js / TypeScript
• Track record of diagnosing hard production failures down to the runtime or transport level, not just restarting services
• Demonstrated ownership of systems in production (performance, uptime, reliability)
• Ability to operate independently and drive ambiguous, high-impact work to completion
• Strong communication skills around tradeoffs and system design decisions

Preferred Qualifications:

• Hands-on experience with Apollo Federation supergraph architectures
• Experience with headless commerce architectures
• Familiarity with AWS event-driven messaging (SNS/SQS)
• Experience with OpenSearch or similar search/retrieval systems
• Experience operating services on Kubernetes with Terraform-managed infrastructure
• Experience integrating third-party commerce platforms at scale
• Exposure to frontend systems (Next.js / React) for API collaboration

Supporting a diverse and inclusive workforce is important to Shutterfly not only because it directly reflects our value of Embracing our Differences, but also because it’s the right thing to do for our business and for our people. We welcome all applicants and evaluate them based on their qualifications. Learn more about our commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion on our Career Site.

This position will accept applications on an ongoing basis until filled.

The compensation package for this role is based on multiple factors, such as job level, responsibilities, location, and candidate experience. The base pay ranges included below are specific to the locations listed, and may not be applicable to other locations.

California : [$159,750-225,500]

Connecticut and New York: [$159,750-206,250]

Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota and Washington: [$159,750-191,000]

Nevada: [$150,000-206,250]

Maryland and New Jersey: [$172,500-206,250]

Hawaii : [$150,000-179,500]

This position may be eligible for a bonus incentive, health benefits, a 401K program, and other employee perks. More details about our company benefits can be found at https://shutterflyinc.com/benefits/.

This opportunity can be remote, but candidates must reside in a state in which Shutterfly is registered to do business. This includes all US states except District of Columbia, North Dakota, Mississippi, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Wyoming.

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