Would like your recommendations on eCommerce packages

Hello,

We are starting a new eCommerce business. I have decades of programming experience in general, but none in eCommerce.

We have webpages under development. So far, I am developing them. They are written in html5 and css3 using bootstrap and use web responsive design (reshape to any size/orientation device) and are loosely based on the Snow web template. We are happy with the webpages.

We will offer very few products to start with. The product set is not fully defined, but for now, think coffee (it's not, though). So the potential customer arrives at our website (based on our successful marketing using social media and more--this is an associate's responsibility). The customer can buy packs of coffee in three flavors. If they buy just one pack, they will pay shipping. If they buy three packs, they get another pack free (and they can mix and match), and they get free shipping. They pay with a credit card, Paypal or other option. They can also use a gift card that was bought on our site.

Before or during checkout, the customer can make an account (or not). With an account, obviously some/most of their information is saved, but also we want them to be able to "subscribe" to a recurring purchase, say weekly or monthly.

We will need to access the customer lists--those with accounts, actual customers, subscription customers--and be able to automatically offer them discounts or coupons based on various factors, like holidays or their birthday. And of course be able to communicate the discounts through email or other social media.

Sales will begin in the US only, but eventually include Europe, then possibly Asia.

And we are just a start-up, so we want all of this for very little cost per month. Not much to ask, right?

So... what eCommerce package can provide all of this?

I am very new to this, and what has caught my eye so far is Magento, Shopify and BigCommerce. My first impression is that Magento is a little harder to implement, Shopify requires WordPress (which we aren't using but could add, I guess) and BigCommerce may be too much to start with. But we want a solution that can grow and grow with us.

So please share you experiences and knowledge; it will be greatly appreciated!

Also... hosting. I'm not trying to clutter this thread--I would think someone out there would host and manage eCommerce together, but maybe not.

We want to go VPS right away. IO Zoom, FastComet and LiquidWeb have caught my eye. Thoughts?

Thank you in advance.

 

Follow-up: I'm continuing looking into this and am leaning toward OpenCart. From what I've read:

Magento -- requires a pretty big hosting footprint, and takes a fair amount of effort to set up?

Shopify -- can get expensive as you add products or add-ons?

osCommerce -- outdated? apparently development stopped for awhile

BigCommerce -- seems too big and complicated?

WooCommerce -- for WordPress, which we're not using

SimpleCart -- this was sooo tempting, but lacked some functionality we want, and has the javascript security risk that hackers can change the price of products (per their own website)


As for OpenCart, it's open source, has a lot of functionality out of the box, has lots of add-ins, and this was important to me: I can isolate OpenCart in it's own folder and use our html/css landing page, which directs users to the store through links.

I would love to hear anyone's thoughts or comments. Thanks.

 

Not a bad decision, go for it. But i believe you under rated Magento because it is one of the best eCommerce Solution in Market and yes you are right there are some cons but they are negligible.

 

Oh, I'm not rating any of these... I have no eCommerce experience at all (yet), so I'm just sharing my impressions so far. I agree... from what I've read, Magento is very widely used and super flexible. But I'm not sure I can justify the effort on my end.

I'm leaning toward a hosted solution now... something like 3dcart, volusion, bigcommerce... I don't know yet. This shouldn't be this difficult, lol.

Thanks for you reply.

 

I'm leaning toward 3dcart. Does anyone have any experience with them? Thank you.