The Immortal Ephemera Store runs on a platform called Ecwid.
There are countless solutions available to power your ecommerce store. This page doesn't intend to tell you that Ecwid is the best option. For as many options as there are to power your store there are just as many different needs required across the spectrum of various online businesses. What this page will tell you is why Ecwid is my best option.
If you feel your needs are similar to my needs then Ecwid may indeed be your best option as well. In that case, and only if you find my explanation helpful, I'd be very grateful if you were to use my Ecwid affiliate link to sign up for your own Ecwid store. By signing up through any Ecwid link I place on this page Ecwid will pay me a small percentage of what you pay them. My intention is to earn it.
My Needs
Have you looked at the Immortal Ephemera Store?
If so you'll see that I use it for sale of vintage movie collectibles. Enlarging that perspective I sell mostly trading cards, photographs and other ephemeral goods. Boiling that down further I sell a large number of unique vintage collectibles. These is no quantity on any listing. By that definition they are one of a kind (OOAK) items. They are mostly inexpensive goods. Average sales price is between $4-$6. Item count as I write this is just over 5,000 with intentions of growing to 10,000 items by the end of 2012.
In a nutshell, Ecwid fits my business because I offer:
A large number of unique SKUs
At a low price
With few shipping options.
What I discovered in the years that I shopped for the perfect ecommerce solution was that several otherwise acceptable solutions offered everything that I needed, however; they tiered their price based upon the number of items offered for sale. Furthermore the tiers are often limiting. A low price is quoted for the lowest tier, but then I would find as few as 100 to 1,000 items would push me up several levels to the highest paid tier.
Ecwid is free for listing up to 100 items. This free plan is their Basic Plan. It costs $17.00 per month for a Silver Store allowing a seller to list up to 20,000 different items. I use the Silver Plan.
You can compare features of each of Ecwid's plans HERE.
Ecwid Integration
This website celebrates its 10th Anniversary in 2012.
Whatever ecommerce solution I decided upon had to plug seamlessly into my site.
This website is run on WordPress. Ecwid comes as and/or with a WordPress plugin.
However, Ecwid can be plugged into any web page, any where.
My Ecwid store is on my businesses' Facebook page. My Ecwid store is available to shop in a Mobile version.
My entire Ecwid store can be accessed from the innocent looking widget that follows:
Not only can my Ecwid webstore fit very snugly into my or any other website at mywebsite.com/store, or any other web address, but it can plug into existing or yet to be created pages on my website simple as a inserting a few lines of code.
Ecwid = ECommerceWIDget.
Ecwid is Simple, Yet Customizable
One of the things I love best about Ecwid is how simple it's product creation pages are. For me the flow is very natural.
Typically I do a CSV import of items I've already prepared listings for on eBay. Don't let that scare you, directions are here. The key piece of info on that page is the "Template CSV." Use the template as a guide. You can, of course, also list items to your Ecwid Store one at a time. I would guess that's actually the most common method to list. But if you're like me and have thousands of listings prepared for other sites, such as eBay, then the CSV import is a lifesaver!
The overall initial set-up of an Ecwid Store was also simple. As simple as any e-Commerce solution I have tried and simpler than most.
Ecwid is also flexible. In my Store you'll find customized Add to Cart buttons and a customized graphic for my Shopping Cart.
In fact, I think you'll be hard-pressed to find any e-commerce Store laid out exactly as mine is. Whether this is good or bad is a judgment of your own taste, but I cannot think of another solution which would allow me to create exactly the Store I envisioned ... without hiring a designer or paying for extra support.
Ecwid gives simple step-by-step instructions to accomplish such customizations on their comprehensive Knowledge Base (Tip: Upon setting up I found the "Store Management" section invaluable). Most customizations are as simple as taking a predefined snippet of code, adding your Ecwid Store ID to it, and pasting it in an already prepared space on the backend of your Ecwid account.
If the Knowledge Base doesn't solve your problem Ecwid has an extremely helpful Forum which has served me with a rapid response the few times I've used it. It's actually been quite awhile since I've used Ecwid's Forums, but this is only because their Knowledge Base explains topics in such plain language that I can typically solve problems or use new features without any further help.
Conclusion
I would not take the step of integrating just any e-commerce solution on Immortal Ephemera. Again, the site is 10 years old, to add a new feature across the site is not only time consuming, but risky. Since I began integrating Ecwid with the Immortal Ephemera site in July 2010 there's been no turning back. While I could have just snapped any e-commerce solution onto my site at things-and0-other-stuff/Store I chose Ecwid because I could also seamlessly integrate my Store listings into other pages like THIS one and THIS one.
I'm confident Ecwid will be around and continue to improve. As a subscriber for nearly two years as of this writing the Ecwid team has continued to update the platform regularly with the latest e-commerce innovations and the system has performed faster and faster.
If your needs fit my needs I wholeheartedly recommend your trying Ecwid for your e-Commerce needs. I think you'll be very happy!
