Accessibility Statement
Built to be used,by every kind of visitor.
This statement explains, in plain language, how The Meow Picks approaches digital accessibility across our storefront — from browsing furniture, technology, and lifestyle collections to completing checkout — what standard we test against, what we already have in place, where we still have work to do, and how to reach us directly if something doesn't work the way it should.
Every collection, open to every visitor.
We built this store around cats and the people who furnish a life around them. That same care is meant to extend to the people doing the browsing. Whether a visitor is comparing wall-mounted cat trees with a screen reader, filtering fountains by keyboard only, or reading a return policy at 200% zoom, our goal is the same: the storefront should work for them, not around them. This statement is our honest account of where that stands today — not a claim of perfection, but a working record we intend to keep improving.
WCAG 2.1, Level AA — our working baseline.
We measure our storefront against the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, Level AA, published by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). Level AA is the standard most commonly referenced in U.S. accessibility litigation and guidance, and it is also the level Shopify itself targets for the underlying platform. Where a component allows it at reasonable effort — for example, color contrast on body text or the size of clickable targets — we aim past AA toward Level AAA, but we do not claim full AAA conformance across the site. Sections below describe exactly what that means in practice, what we have already implemented, and what is still in progress.
Automated scans, plus a person actually using the site.
No single tool catches everything, so we combine automated auditing with hands-on review before and after major theme or page changes.
axe DevTools
Automated scans of every template — product, collection, cart, and policy pages — checking against WCAG success criteria before pages go live.
WAVE
Visual evaluation of heading structure, alt text presence, and contrast on a rolling sample of the site, including new product listings.
Manual keyboard testing
Full checkout, filter, and search flows are walked through using Tab, Shift+Tab, Enter, and Escape only — no mouse involved.
Screen readers
Key journeys are reviewed with VoiceOver on macOS and iOS, and NVDA on Windows, to confirm labels and reading order make sense out loud.
What's live on the storefront today.
Keyboard operable
Navigation, category filters, the cart drawer, and checkout can all be reached and operated using a keyboard alone, with a visible outline showing exactly where focus sits — the same dashed ring you can see moving through this page.
Structured content
Pages use real heading levels, list markup, and labeled form fields rather than styled text pretending to be structure, so screen readers can navigate by section instead of guessing.
Contrast-checked palette
Our cream, ink, brass, and forest palette is verified for WCAG AA text contrast on every background it's paired with, including buttons, tags, and form fields.
Resizable, reflowing text
Layouts hold together up to 200% browser zoom and with larger system font sizes, without text being clipped or overlapping other content.
Descriptive alt text
Current product photography — furniture, technology, and lifestyle items alike — carries alt text describing the item and its material, not just a generic file name.
Skip-to-content link
Keyboard and screen-reader users can jump straight past repeated navigation to the main content of any page, including this one.
Known limitations, stated plainly.
A statement that only lists successes isn't useful to anyone. These are the gaps we're aware of today.
A rolling plan, not a one-time fix.
Q3 2026 — Full audit
A complete axe and WAVE sweep across every template, plus manual keyboard and screen-reader passes on checkout and product filtering.
Q4 2026 — Priority fixes
Remediating alt text on legacy imagery, adding captions to maker-supplied videos, and re-tagging our most-downloaded PDF spec sheets.
Q1 2027 — Re-test
Independent re-scan of the fixes above, confirmed against the same WCAG 2.1 AA criteria used in the original audit.
Quarterly, ongoing
Every quarter after, we repeat a lighter-weight review, so accessibility keeps pace as new products, pages, and theme features are added.
Some of this store isn't ours to fully rewrite.
Checkout, payment, and account pages run on Shopify's own hosted, encrypted checkout, which we do not build ourselves; Shopify maintains and tests that experience against its own accessibility standard (see Shopify Platform below). Our live chat widget and any embedded maps, videos, or social feeds are likewise provided by outside vendors. We select vendors that publish their own accessibility commitments, and we will remove or replace any embedded tool that we find creates a genuine barrier for customers using assistive technology.
Tested combinations.
We test the storefront against the following browser and assistive technology pairings. Other combinations may work but haven't been formally verified by us.
| Browser | Assistive technology | Platform | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chrome | NVDA | Windows | Verified |
| Safari | VoiceOver | macOS | Verified |
| Safari | VoiceOver | iOS | Verified |
| Edge | Narrator | Windows | Verified |
| Chrome | TalkBack | Android | Verified |
| Firefox | NVDA | Windows | Verified |
Found a barrier? Tell us directly.
If any part of this site is difficult to use with a keyboard, screen reader, or other assistive technology, we want to know. We treat every report as a real priority, not a formality.
What to include in your report
- The page URL or product name where the issue occurred.
- What you were trying to do — for example, add an item to your cart or filter by category.
- The browser and assistive technology you were using, if applicable.
- What happened, and what you expected to happen instead.
We reply within 1 business day, Monday through Friday. If a fix will take longer than that, we'll tell you what we're doing about it and when to expect an update.
The standards guiding this work.
Aesthi Technologies Inc. sells exclusively to customers within the United States. This section is provided for transparency and is not legal advice.
Americans with Disabilities Act, Title III
We treat the ADA's requirement that places of public accommodation be accessible as extending, in practice, to our online storefront, and we design accordingly.
W3C Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
Our working conformance target, described in full under Conformance Target above, is Level AA.
Section 508 (reference standard)
We are not a federal contractor and Section 508 does not apply to us directly, but we use its published technical criteria as an additional design reference where useful.
California Unruh Civil Rights Act
For customers in California, we're mindful that state law has been read by courts to apply accessibility expectations to commercial websites.
Truthful, non-misleading claims
The statements on this page describe our actual practices and known gaps; we do not claim a certification or conformance level we have not tested for.
General applicability
Nothing in this statement limits any right or remedy you already hold under federal or state consumer protection law.
Built on Shopify — accessible at the platform level too.
The Meow Picks runs on Shopify, which publishes its own accessibility conformance work covering checkout and core platform infrastructure, separate from the storefront design decisions described on this page. You can read Shopify's own statement and conformance reports at shopify.com/accessibility.