LemonStand - eCommerce Blog about LemonStand shopping cart, news and tutorials

Showcase: Little Moose

4 Comment(s) | published by Danny H. on Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Little Moose just recently launched their online store using LemonStand. It was built by James Saunders and features a great design that compliments the products well. The shopping experience is simple and straightforward too; just what drives conversions.

Self described as a shop for cute gifts, bags and accessories from top brands like Hello Sailor, Doodllery and Disaster. In addition to big brands, they try to showcase products from small independent boutiques and new designers as well.

We're going to try doing our Customer Showcases in a Q&A format, starting with Little Moose. Unless specifically mentioned, all quotes come from James Saunders. Let us know what you think of the format by leaving your comment below.

How do you feel about integrating custom designs with LemonStand, in comparison to other shopping carts?

"Before finding Lemonstand I investigated several other carts, ranging from free opensource to the monthly hosted solutions. I never really felt comfortable with implementing my own design with any of them. There always seemed to be restrictions with every solution – be it incredibly rigid templating, inflexible elements or simply a bloated language.

As soon as I found Lemonstand it felt familiar. I felt at home looking over the demo store and making quick changes here and there to get a feel for how the software would work and react. The templating system and partials mean that each element is self-contained.

In all honesty, it was easy to forget that Lemonstand was actually a very high powered shopping cart because everything was so easy and intuitive. I created my homepage in basic HTML and really just dragged and dropped snippets of the code across. It really took the fuss out of the process allowing me to concentrate on creating the right solution and not just settling for what was on offer."

What are some of your favorite features of LemonStand, and why?

"It’s so difficult to pick out just a few because LemonStand does all fundamentals and even some extras, so well.

The templating system makes for a really easy and flexible process enabling me to implement a design which wasn’t limited by technology or structure.

The seamless integration with Google Analytics is a real treat.

What struck me with other carts was that you would get a very basic system as standard and then have to rely on additional (bloated) plugins to maximize maximize your return. That is not the case at all with LemonStand.

I have to give a special mention to the support of the LemonStand team as well. They’ve been quick to respond to any queries and actively working to create solutions to specific problems that I’ve faced. There are new things coming through every week – customizable HTML email templates, a robust and effective blog module - For me, that makes LemonStand the best option."

Did using LemonStand make your development process faster, more enjoyable, more creative?

"Absolutely, without a doubt. I never once worried that something wouldn’t be possible. And really, that is the highest accolade I can bestow upon LemonStand.

My creativity isn’t limited by the technology. The templating means that the workflow is efficient and speedy and that makes for a far more enjoyable experience than I’ve had with other carts."

Would you recommend LemonStand to others who need an eCommerce site? Why?

"I already have!

From a client, designer or developer perspective I can’t see any reason why you wouldn’t want to use LemonStand. The dashboard is intuitive and responsive for the user, the system encourages creativity and the PHP framework allows for a seemingly endless array of future development, beyond the impressive amount of features already available."

Do you plan on using LemonStand again, for future projects?

"There’s no doubt in my mind that I’ll be using Lemonstand again. It represents exceptional quality, support and value for money."

How does your client feel about using LemonStand? Do they have a favorite feature?

"I think the biggest compliment from the client is that they haven’t once asked me how to do anything. Within a few hours of handing them over the controls there were products on the site, pages filling with content and a couple of blog posts. You couldn’t wish for any more as a developer.

They’re delighted that the site looks and works as I’d shown them – nothing has been compromised which is a real rarity in any development, let alone something as complicated as eCommerce."

- James Saunders, Developer – Little Moose

“I’ve found navigating through the dashboard to be very easy. Adding a product is simple and straightforward and the layout makes it easy to understand the next steps. Everything seems to come naturally and effortlessly. The whole management of the ‘shop’ is really well thought out.

I’m really pleased with the built-in blog module as well.”

- Carrie Lewis, Owner – Little Moose

Schedule maintenance downtime June 24

0 Comment(s) | published by Danny H. on Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Our host is going to be some network maintenance that may result in some downtime between 9pm - 11pm PST on June 24.

This means software updates may not work. We recommend you do not attempt to update your LemonStand installations during this time, even if it does connect to our server.

Thank you

Blog module released

0 Comment(s) | published by Aleksey B. on Monday, June 07, 2010

Several days ago we published the blog module. The module is quite simple, but powerful enough to satisfy the needs of most eCommerce websites. This is the very same module which powers this blog and which we have been using for many months. The module implements the following features:

Blog post categories (no tagging). Each post can belong to multiple categories.
Blog posts in HTML format. The HTML editor is configurable.
Commenting with moderation.
New comments email notifications.
Comments email subscriptions - allows visitors to subscribe to email comment notifications of a specific post.
RSS feeds for posts and comments.
SEO-friendly URLs.
As usual in LemonStand - any custom design can be used for front-end pages.
API for accessing blog posts and categories.

The API allows you to load specific categories from the database, display the blog archive, use custom URLs and do other interesting things. For example, you can use the blog module for displaying testimonials or press releases.

You can find detailed implementation documentation with examples and a comprehensive API description in our Wiki.

Showcase: Edgeware Products

0 Comment(s) | published by Danny H. on Monday, June 07, 2010

Edgeware offers consumers high performance manual and electric knife sharpeners as well as food preparation kitchen tools. The product line was created for cooking enthusiasts looking for superior products with innovative designs.

FLEX360 designed and developed this website, and used LemonStand to power the back-end. Their development and management team were very pleased with the process and result.

After a long process to identify a flexible eCommerce solution that was a good fit, we implemented the LemonStand application and feel like we hit a home run. The features and functions fit our needs better than other solutions we evaluated and the ease to which we could expand the application made the decision a no brainer.

Marrying LemonStand's functionality to our custom designs was nearly seamless and allowed us to shave countless hours off the process of getting the site up and running. With very little training, our client was easily able to manage their inventory and orders through LemonStand's intuitive interface.

Brent Birch, Director – FLEX360

Their development team also had some things to say about working with LemonStatand.

LemonStand has ended our search for an eCommerce solution. We've tried a lot of other products out there including Magento, Spree and Trading Eye.

None of them come close to LemonStand in terms of features, flexibility and support. Edgeware needed a store locator. I was able to quickly create a module for this using LemonStand. The locator module allows the client to add their store locations through the admin. The location's address is geocoded for them after a new location is added. The locations can be searched on the front-end by address and/or zip code. The results are displayed within a Google map. LemonStand is really easy to extend.

We needed the ability to let our client upload product manuals that would be available to download on the frontend. I was able to create a module to do this with only a few lines of code and the prompt support I've received. The shipping options, payment methods and tax classes gave us every administrative option we needed. We encountered no limitations and this area of the admin was set up beautifully.

Some of my other favorite things about LemonStand is the software update process, code editor and the dashboard with Google Analytics integration.

Code Editor

The code editor was a big surprise. I honestly didn't expect to like it, but it was really easy to use especially in full-screen mode. I was able to implement our custom design quickly and efficiently.

Dashboard

The dashboard with Google Analytics has a major 'wow' factor. It's very easy to see what kind of traffic we're getting versus how many sales are coming in and you get this information immediately after logging in. You can add, remove and move dashboard items to personalize it to taste.

Software Update Process

The product update process happens behind the scenes once you initiate it through the admin. There are no files to download. It couldn't be easier to get up-to-date.There are so many more features that I didn't mention. They're all so well done and I could easily spend a lot of time on each.

Chris Earls, Developer – FLEX360