Don't be mislead by those who tell you you need a paid solution or a custom site.
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I don't believe anyone was giving misleading advice. It seems as if the original poster was asking for opinions, and people were responding accordingly. And most if not all replies have included carts that are free.
I suggest the TS, look at all the free ones first. Most of the ones that cost money offer a free trial also. But between the free ones, if you arent too big and dont need a ton of toys, you should find one that works perfect for you. Many free ones are great and as said, you get the code!!
Last edited by BareApparel; May 10th, 2008 at 06:01 PM.
Here is a few good sites that may help, first is a blog that compares a lot of carts and talks about pros and cons of each the other 2 sites review carts.
I use Zen cart for multiple stores. It's fairly easy to learn - yes, some of the features are a little obscure to find, but most everything I've desired is there.
Most mods are free, others are very inexpensive.
And - most importantly - if you do embroidery - zen-cart has an attribute that you can price PER LETTER. For example, on one of my store sites, you get the first 10 letters included in your embroidery - over that, we charge per letter. Functionality is built in to zen cart.
Additionally - the community has published a book - they sell it for $40 - it's a great HOW TO on setting up a site.
Technology has caught-up with accessibility. There was a time that a safe, reliable shopping cart solution was out of reach financially for most people, or just didn't exist. Now, picking a solution has become more a matter of preference rather than a matter of what"s "better".
I've been using X-cart for 3+ years and I've found it to be stable with LOTS of features. Sure, there have been a few problems: It has a bit of a learning curve to customize and setup. But what I think makes it an excellent choice is user community support. Many good hosting companies have servers specifically configured for this cart, and there are a LOT of 3rd party providers for customization; so much so that it seems to have become a cottage industry on it's own. X-cart listens to and works with these people, so there really isn't much X-cart cannot be configured to do.
Please note, I have absolutely NO affiiliation with the company, and I realize my choice isn't for everybody. Just my 2 cents.
i love oscommerce .. its free and works great.. completely open source and easy to customize.. there are a ton of add ons and such that are all free too.
my site is done with oscommerce and i had an online paintball store that i just sold that was also setup with oscommere
Re: ECommerce Software? 
