Hi Darrly,

I fail to see anything remarkable about it - what makes it different from most others? If it's the columns you can see, most carts can offer this if you just tweak the templates a little.

I use oscommerce - seems to do the job, and is free.

Cheers

Chris
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Safenet Systems - A Microsoft and Sophos partner
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Thanks for the link, it's always good market research to see what other e-commerce systems are impressing people.

"What software is this shopping cart"

I'm guessing that it is a bespoke development rather than an off the shelf system. I've done my usual first look research and I cannot identify other websites that use something similar. The system is based on a Windows .NET platform so that kind of rules it out of being a free open source system based on an non-Microsoft open source technology platform like osCommerce.

"what kind of shopping cart can do this"

If you can zero in on a list of features you like about this system then it might be easier to answer that question. For me, at a first glance, what this cart is doing is presenting a busy, confusing user interface, which may make it appear to be doing more than it really does. I personally do not like busy confusing cluttered interfaces, I think they can put potential customers off. I'm a bit confused by the product browse features which is split between a Categories list on the left, and other lists at the bottom like Inks and toners, Software Hardware etc.

One thing I can see which is really different from the norm is the rewards scheme, but this is not unique since there are rewards scheme modules for osCommerce. It looks like the system copes with thousands of products, one of my clients is quite happily using osCommerce with hundreds of products but I am not completely confident that an osCommerce system would cope well with thousands of products like this site (it may cope but not be as easy to maintain).

"It seems to be perfect shopping cart"

I wouldn't go as far as to say that. A perfect shopping cart wouldn't have any faults or lack important feaures. At a first glance it looks like this one does. For instance, an online shop with 100's or 1000's of products should really have a good full text search capability. This one doesn't, it appears to only have a limited word in title search (e.g. search for tablet pc and no results are returned even though these words are mentioned in the business machines products area) and this missing feature could be a major drawback (osCommerce does have a full text search feature). This lack of feature may also suggest that the system is built on an Access database rather than a SQLServer database (Access doesn't have full text search, SQLServer does, osCommerce is built upon the MySQL database which does have full text search) and this may also account for the slow speed of the system.

However it could be the perfect system for you, in which case contact the website owners to see if they are willing to share the technology or put you in touch with their e-commerce supplier.
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Paul - www.awebapart.com - 'a web apart'
create, update your website today - the online professional site builder

Hi darrly

could you point out in what way is it a lot better than Oscommerce as:

1: if you are trying to get people to use this software cart then you need to be a bit more specific if you are going to try and convince people to part with their money when theres the option of a free one. What is the USP of this product?

2: If this is your website then I'd like to say it is very nice but doesn't push me to want the software cart.

3: If you are after traffic then my hats off to you cause i went and had a look.

4: Your post is very ambigious and I'm not sure what your goal here is, are you trying to sell this software or are you trying to show us your website or are reccommending the software?

Peter S
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www.Ushopit.co.uk

According to their website, the company in question, Supplies Team, have been around for 30 years and have annual sales of £230 million. This puts them and their website in the same league as companies like staples, dabs, etc. This makes it even more likely that they have had a system custom made for them, at quite a cost I would imagine. It is therefore unlikely that the startups here could afford the same system. However just because a company has paid big bucks for a system that doesn't mean that there aren't much better value for money systems out there, systems that do similar things (even some things better), available for us smaller companies.
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Paul - www.awebapart.com - 'a web apart'
create, update your website today - the online professional site builder

The cart is called e-supply, but I'm not sure if it is still supported.  You could google it - or why not email their webmaster and ASK - he or she won't bite!

With regard to OS Commerce - the reason they all look the same is because the store owners don't have the imagination / creative skill to convert the basic application into a truly customised store.  There are some brilliant OS commerce stores out there but they are the ones where the owners have been prepared to work at the store.  You can bet the Supplies Team website didn't come out of the box like that!

Hello Darrly,

You may want to take a look at UniTrader 2006 which you can download from www.unitechnology.co.uk. It's free to download and start using, so at the very least you have the option of seeing if it's what you're looking for.

Many of the templates available allow 3 column layout, and content sections can be redistributed to suit your needs.

We do also provide a Bespoke Template service which then gives you the ability to stipulate your requirements. We've recently finished a Bespoke Template for the website www.cardsandgifts-direct.co.uk, if you're interested to see 'one that we prepared earlier'.

Hope that's helpful to you.

Sarah From UniTechnology
www.unitechnology.co.uk