Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Ecommerce Hosting & Discussion : ECommerce Cart Software for Specific Needs & Good Community (Maybe Commercial)

[Computer Candy]

I am looking for ECommerce Cart software that will fit a lot specific needs that I have. I was hoping some of you with some personal experience might be able to point me in the right direction.

Free or commercial is not all "that" important really. I am starting to lead towards commercial just because I can have a more reasonable expectation of good support (hopefully) and prompt security updates and hopefully feature updates and such.

My budget for commercial software would probably cap out at around $200-300.

As far as specific features, I have a long list of things I want to do with it but I'll try to keep this post focused on the few things I want most at this time.

I tend to reeealy customize the look, skin or templates. Whatever you want to call it. So ease of skinning would be great since I really want to make it my own.

One of the main things I am looking for though, is a very good community support base. I work on a lot of forum based sites and I am used to big contributor community support bases like you see with vBulletin and IPB.

Since my needs will likely be kind of different than most carts stock features as time goes on, it is nice to have a strong community of custom coders and contributors so that I can request or even commission someone once in a while to help me better customize my site.

For example, another one of the things I am thinking about doing is adding a consignment type sales feature. One of my main sites will be for toys and collectibles and I am thinking it might be nice to have a feature where approved individuals could sell their items through my site for a fee for their listing for x amount of time and a commission of their sale if made. It would be nice if they had their own cp also, to submit and track their items and such.

That is just one of many things I am thinking about that is likely not a standard stock feature or even common addition/contribution. So a good and big contribution and support based community is probably a must.

So far I have tried a couple free carts. One was OSCommerce and I just really did not like the dated feel to it. I am not insulting the software and i do not want to start some sort of war over it with the die hard fans. It was just not for me. It felt outdated and clumsy for me.

Another I have tried and did indeed design a site around was Zen Cart. I liked it much better that OSC since my customizations did not demand as high of a learning curve but the Admin CP was still a bit unintuitive and clumsy for me.

It's not like I have an aversion to long hand customizations via code edits and such. It's just that if I have a lot to make, I would rather not have to spend hours digging through strangely organized files to find the right place to make my edits and such. For example, if I wanted to make a custom "About Us" page in Zen Cart, there were a few ways to do it. Though easy enough in "some" ways, none of the methods were that uniform or made all that much clear intuitive sense.

I took a look at JShop briefly and the Admin CP seemed a bit more intuitive, but I haven't looked at their community yet.

I guess you can also probably see that I like a well organized Admin CP that is intuitive and clear to navigate. But I have some other custom needs also. Like possible POS connectivity. I like to be able to very easily manage payment gateways, shipping modules, custom fields, product attributes like colors and sizes, etc.

POS connectivity/integration would be very nice to add someday, too. I've not yet picked out POS software, but it would be very nice to have a couple good options if at all possible.

Most importantly though, I very much would like a good contributor community support base like vBulletin or IPB has.

Right now I am leaning towards Zen Cart for a free solution. But I don't know much at all about which commercial solutions might do it better or even which have the best reputations for that matter.

I just re-read all of that and it was pretty long winded. Sorry about that. I am a bit over tired I suppose. I hope it all makes sense, though. Any personal experiences, advice or pointing in the right direction would be fantastic.

There are just sooo many commercial carts, I hoped to narrow it down by asking you first.

Thank you!

-edit-
I forgot to mention I do not need hosting. I have my own dedicated self managed server. Oh, and I prefer PHP SQL if possible.

[JLHC]

I will suggest you to have a look at Magento Commerce.
It is by far one of the best open source shopping cart around.
It is also backed by a big bunch of die hard fans in their community forum.

[e-onlinedata support]

ZenCart, was initially based on osCommerce code but has developed dramatically and is a fully independent product. Known for its long list of added features, ZenCart is PHP-based and uses a MySQL database and HTML components. Its frequently praised gift certificate module allows merchants to create, distribute and manage digital coupons.

Have you looked into...

ShopSite: Also server-based software, ShopSite is widely considered one of the easiest solutions to set up and run. Its Pro version (cost: $1,295) took the number one spot in Shopping-Cart-Review.com’s 2008 ranking of popular shopping carts. ShopSite is also available in less costly Manager (for stores with 15 products or more) and Starter (for stores with just a few products) versions, and a monthly payment option is available. ShopSite supports PayPal payments.

X-Cart: X-Cart’s major selling point is its combination of a 30-day trial period/money-back guarantee and free technical support for first-time buyers. That can help tame the fears of those uncertain about paying for shopping cart software. PHP template-based with open-source code, X-Cart may be harder to install than some other choices, so its free tech support, forums and knowledge base provide valuable assistance. Its license fee is $229 for the Gold version and $575 for the Pro version.

All choices offer a range of features and links to sample sites running their software, so it’s a good idea to evaluate the products by experimenting with the carts on those sites. An even better idea to think hard about the unique needs of your store before beginning the hunt for a shopping cart provider.

With many and varied options available, finding the most appropriate individual choice will save the most time, money and energy in the long-term.

Sounds like you've already done some shopping around. Try some demos and see which program works best for you.

Good Luck and Happy Commerce!


Erin

[Computer Candy]

Thanks for the suggestions. I know about Zen Cart already and that it is an OSC shoot off and such. One thing I like most about it is the community base that it has.

I am looking for a product with a very large and active contribution community support base like that. You didn't really mention if the others you brought up have that, but I will certainly check them out.

Thanks again and keep the suggestions coming if you have them.

P.S. $1,295 is far too much for me. I am looking at $200-$300 at most... for now anyhow.