LemonStand CMS - Ok, to be a right asshole: How have you solved the tax issue. For instance, the UK is going from

Frinkky

Ok, to be a right asshole:

How have you solved the tax issue. For instance, the UK is going from 17.5% to 20% vat soon. How does your software cope? Do I need to manually make this change when the tax change goes live? How does it track products (basic cake doesn't earn vat but chocolate cake does - we are screwed up over here ;)).

Someone mentioned ModX - I've just started using it - is there a fully explained version of the snippet necessary? Is there a full tutorial describing all this? How about the chunks - hopefully they all work without question.

Does it require mootools or can I use jquery? (modx question)

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Danny

Frinkky, I think you need to understand the "tax problem" first. The problem was not about setting rates like in your example. That's the simple part. And yes, you need to manually set it of course. Imposing automatic rates wouldn't work for every merchant obviously, and that is why nobody else does it either. Setting or changing your rates would take a couple of minutes.

You can set tax rates for different types of products easily using tax class. You set up the rates and save the tax class with a name. When creating a product, you choose the tax class. Easy.

The problem I referred to was related to how sums are calculated, decimal points and rounding issues. The problem was also worsened by how tax inclusive prices are displayed and how they are calculated behind the scenes. The result was that in some cases, the final amount that the customer was charged could out 1 or a few cents per product. If many products were ordered this could result in it being out by dollars. And at the end of a year, a high volume retailer could have some real issues.
LemonStand also suffered from these problems. The majority of merchants would not ever notice it. But it was there, and it was a problem for some. But we heard the community and found a way to solve it. We addressed it as soon as we understood the issue (which was pretty complex. It took quite a bit of research and help from some of our beta testers from the UK)

I don't know what you are referring to regarding ModX. LS isn't and never will be integrated with ModX. I don't know where you got this from. Modx and LemonStand are not affiliated or related in any way. Maybe that's not what you meant. If it isn't, please clarify.

LemonStand uses MooTools for the front-end AJAX by default. There is a simple library for sending LemonStand-specific AJAX request, based on MooTools. And this library can be implemented in jQuery or any other JS library. If you wanted, we could explain how to do it (in our support forum) - and we'll likely explain it in our documentation at some point.

MooTools is used just as a default implementation, and as everything in LemonStand the default implementation can be replaced with something else.

Even with the default implementation, you could use jQuery . For example, check our website. We use it for many things. But forms are processed using the default AJAX library.

WelshStew

As I have previously stated, I am looking forward to LS coming out of Beta and will probably use it on a couple of projects if the client is after a good quality, easy to use commerce site.

The only reason for the comparison with WPeCommerce is because someone was asking what the differences were and why that justified the price you were charging. I think you have answered this admirably.

However, I also think that WPeCommerce has it's place and a lot of people are making serious money from online stores using this product.

I would still like to see a comparison with other "for purpose" ecommerce software suites, such as PresaShop, OpenCart, Magento, etc. As these are direct competitors it would be nice to be able to quickly and easily see what you can offer above and beyond these products. Personally, I don't have the time to "dig in" to every product that is available, therefore I am really looking forward to seeing those marketing feature set pages ;o)

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saltedm8

There are so many competitors that have been around allot longer and have proven results, eventually your software might get to that point but people are wary of new software's especially those that use any type of payment system as its not as 'tested' as the others.

Obviously you have a unique selling point with the tax being calculated correctly, but it would not take much for megento to not copy the code but do the same thing to theirs.

As magento for example is far more established and is tested fully, also that the code can easily be reproduced just written differently I would still say 'why re-invent the wheel ?'

I would wish you luck with what you are doing and applaud your creativity to improve ecommerce systems but if I was an investor for example I would rather invest in magento as its a proven product, as a web developer I would still place my bets that magento, looking as if that would be your main competition they will not only match everything you have done, but better it.

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WelshStew

I would have thought they would use existing payment gateways, not build there own
I wouldn't see this as a USP. If I was using magento, and it wasn't applying tax correctly then I would just show prices including tax, and work it out manually. A pain, but doable.
yeah, but it wasn't when it started and the market already had some big players in it when they launched. That's a bit like Toyota saying "lets not build any more cars, as Ford already have some"
I disagree, and think that the two products are aimed at different markets. magento is, in reality, a enterprise level ecommerce product. In fact, that is how they sell it - with the only difference is that if you want support / PCI compliance, you need to pay for that.

I feel that LS is targeted at the SME market.

However, I do agree that LS may find it difficult to make in roads into a mature market with their current Licence structure. I have read that they plan to release developer licences, which will allow developers to be able to play with the product for free, but then they are relying on the developers to make the recommendations to the client. And as we know clients have their own ideas ;o)

I also haven't been able to find much information around what this licence covers, in terms of product. Is it a perpetual licence for the major version you are on? a yearly subscription with free upgrades? or some other variation ?

If it was me, and just me talking - I would look into maybe releasing it for free (maybe with a lemonstand link / global branding in the footer), thereby getting the name out there and lots of links into the site. You can then offer removal of global branding for a cost, and support at a separate cost. I am sure you have thought about all these options and gone with what you think is best for your business model.

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WelshStew
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mote

I was pointed to this forum by a colleague who new I had become a fan of Lemonstand :)

Obviously there are always horses for courses and for me Lemonstand has been perfect, I have tried a few eCommerce systems in the past - Magento, Cube and VirtueMart. Some of this was basic, surface testing however in all circumstances I found them either awkward to style or hard for my customers to learn.

The first time I saw Lemonstand - it clicked. This is the way eCommerce solutions should be done. Easy to use, style and a UI that just works.

I am sure other solutions have moved along since I first tried them, but LS was just so easy.

The killer for me has been the support. Even when I was just another Beta tester the personalised help and prompt responses won me over. I had no problems paying the $300 charge.

I am getting closer to my first live site with LS, and can't wait to send it live. I highly recommend people try it.

seventhfury

Actually, what you're paying for when you purchase LemonStand is a very progressive cart system coupled with a hard-working team that is constantly improving and supporting their product. I signed on for the Alpha testing team back in October and I can say with great confidence that although LS was amazing back then it has quickly become more and more amazing in the past few months.

The things you can do with the LS shopping cart are just beginning, and from what I've seen so far I wouldn't go with another cart ever again. I've been able to set up my cart and fully customize everything about it to suit my needs exactly. It's SEO friendly and has a wide range of applications.

Since I built my store using LemonStand I've seen my business triple, and I don't think it's a coincidence. I've used Wordpress to build plenty of sites, and will continue to do so for certain projects. However, when it comes to eCommerce cart systems, you get what you pay for.

Here's my site, Seventh.Ink Shirts and Apparel. I'm honestly telling you to at least try the Beta, what can you lose? You might be more impressed than you think.

seventhfury

Just wanted to second this opinion. Well said!

Danny

That is clearly a benefit of LemonStand, but it's not our USP at all. In fact, I hope Varien fixes it for the sake of humanity. It's simply the right thing to do.

I only brought that particular case up as an example of the type of support and care we put into our software. We are committed to supporting our customers and resolving any issues that come up. We've proven we can do this, even with a small team and thousands of alpha/beta testers over the last 10 months.

Our USP is LemonStand's API. There is no cart available that allows you to customize literally anything, without hacking the core. If you would like to learn more about this, we have documentation on it and will have more promotional driven content soon as well.

Of course we have competitors. But bettering something is not as simple as you make out. LemonStand's API and fast and enjoyable user experience is part of the very framework (figuratively and literally) of the software. For an existing piece of software to compare, the authors can't simply bolt on a few features. That's not what this is all about. Things would need to be re-built from the ground up. And the logistics of that is a nightmare.

Aside from that, there are many other unique features such as: easily customizable email triggering and templates (editable via Admin w/ variables), handy syntax highlighting code editor, extremely flexible and simple to use CMS, very robust discount engine, easy import/export of theme + all pages & content, automated backup, big range of visual reports that can be expanded upon easily, order routes (for processing / fulfillment automation and flow), etc.

You may gloss over that list and think "I know other carts have some of those features too" and that might be true. And that is why up until now, I haven't given a laundry list of features because you can't compare complex software that way. I'm sure a lot of Kia's have many of the same features as Porsches. But can you honestly say they provide the same experience?

It's not about the sheer number of features. It's about how they are implemented and the experience of using them.

If you actually use LemonStand and see how different the CMS is from say Magento, Interspire or Pinnacle, I bet you'll be pleased.

Tom

hmm.. very odd lots of single people signing up and commenting just on this thread!

I will throw in my own observation here:

$300 - No Thanks.

A price tag usually means proprietary code, which means I have to rely on a support desk for help and if something goes horribly wrong my source of revenue is dead in the water. I have used proprietary code and seen it when something is updated incorrectly, it causes too much hassle. That is why I am strongly put off by the $300 price tag. I see the website says its 100% customisable, that doesn't mean you can access the source code and modify it and I can not see anything that says otherwise.

I would much prefer to go with an open source solution that allows hundreds, if not thousands of users to contribute and fix any problems that arise, and I could even fix some issues if its a PHP driven application.

Obviously this is my view on the software (with my brief use of the demo) and my reasons for not considering it, there are however plenty of people who I am sure will love your application and with the templating system it gives template creators more ways to make money, which is no bad thing. So I hope it all goes well for you.

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