Examples of Multi-Store Sites ???

Any live/active examples out there utilizing OpenCart's MULTI-STORE function/capabilities ??

I would very much like to see how this feature can be used in a practical setting.

Same here !!

zh

Take a look at mine in my signature. More than 30 stores running from 1 oc installation

labeshops wrote:Take a look at mine in my signature. More than 30 stores running from 1 oc installation

SWEET MOTHER OF ODIN . . .

So ALL of those shops are being run off of a SINGLE OpenCart install and database?

I read About LABEShops - VERY impressive and inspiring.
(it reminds me of the NetShops.com (now Hayneedle.com) story - started with one specialty store and grew to dozens)


Do you use a particular plugin or bridge to connect your WordPress Blog to/with your primary OpenCart based site(s)?




This kind of example of OC's multi-store capabilities is EXACTLY the kind of thing I wanted to see.
VERY IMPRESSIVE and a "tipping of the scales" in my decision process between Magento and OpenCart.


(now, if you could just start offering some high quality superhero costumes on your CosplayCostumeCloset site,
you might have a new customer - hehe)





KEEP UP THE GREAT WORK !!! ... and THANK YOU for sharing your multi-store site(s).

Thanks

Yes, they all run from 1 install of opencart (except for 3 sex toy sites that are affiliate stores. I think eventually my adult stores will be a second installation of oc, but haven't decided yet). All based on 3 free themes with modifications by me (most default theme) and about $150 of mods. Thousands of products to add yet - including superhero costumes

Hayneedle is my hero (though I didn't know about them until I had like 6 stores already lol). Wish I had their budget and staff though! It's just lil ol me

Wordpress is just in its own directory and I link to it. No special bridge or anything. Actually pre-oc, labeshops.com was just the blog with links to my standalone stores. Now it is uberfied with shopping on it as well as links to my stores. I just updated wordpress last week and need to reset up the template to match the store - haven't had time on that one yet. I use feedburner to put headlines wherever I want them from the blog.

I played with magento on and off for like 4 months without figuring out how to make it work for me before I found opencart. Had my first stores running with oc in under a week, all online within 2 weeks! Of course always tweaking and refining but that's normal for a site - especially one of mine lol Mainly just need to slam adding products in. Will eventually have over 50,000 products across all the stores - some unique to one store, some shared by 2-3+.

Very cool. two questions:

Is it possible to set it up where the shopping cart will hold items across multiple sites? When I tried to add items from different sites, this was not happening.

Viewing the cart in my opinion should be a one click button. I could not get to the cart using chrome on my xp machine because the pull down action was faulty and always closed as I tried to mouse over to the view cart button. Is it easy to remove this feature in Opencart and just have a view cart button?

There already is a view cart button in the header (on most themes at least), so yeah, you can remove the drop down one in the header if you want. I did on some of my stores.

Add to cart across multi stores is a bit tricky. I believe there is an extension that lets you carry over sessions from one to another, though I haven't tried it yet. Actually I have found if you add items to 1 store, then go to another, add items both are not shown if you click on the shopping cart BUT they all show up when you continue to checkout. At least it does in 1.5.2. It's one of my things to clean up a bit in the future.

Viewing the cart using the pull down menu seems to be a coding problem on your site. After you open the pull down menu and start to move the mouse down to the view cart button, it closes as soon as it touches a hyperlink under the pull down menu.

This theme performs well: http://santoshsetty.com/opencart/demos/luvj/?theme=Pink

I found this theme from a discussion on coding in this forum: http://forum.opencart.com/viewtopic.php ... &start=100

Any more OpenCart multi-site stores out there to share?

labeshops wrote:Take a look at mine in my signature. More than 30 stores running from 1 oc installation

Hi labeshops,

I'm very impressed by your successful works of multi-stores from one oc.

I have some questions for you after visiting some of your domains,

1. it seems that not all domains apply to ssl (https://) to complete a payment, why?

2. I know normally one store is put under the base of public_html folder.
Which folder will be held for the second domain?

3. Similar questions for themes and some important files such as .htaccess

Many Thanks

Daniel

Please see this thread

Example of a highly tuned multi store and multi channel commerce opencart store including, ebay, amazon.. warehouse logistic management etc:

http://forum.opencart.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=106371

daniel2008 wrote:

labeshops wrote:Take a look at mine in my signature. More than 30 stores running from 1 oc installation

Hi labeshops,

I'm very impressed by your successful works of multi-stores from one oc.

I have some questions for you after visiting some of your domains,

1. it seems that not all domains apply to ssl (https://) to complete a payment, why?

2. I know normally one store is put under the base of public_html folder.
Which folder will be held for the second domain?

3. Similar questions for themes and some important files such as .htaccess

Many Thanks

Daniel

1. I currently only have 1 ssl certificate as I don't have the budget for a multidomain one right now. It will be added in the future. (my former software was hacked last year so i'm still rebuilding - only have about 1/5th of my products online right now). It's on the installation domain, labeshops.com so technically since all shops run from that domain, they are secure, though the browser lock thing doesn't show. Anyone that asks, I tell them to check out thru Labeshops.com if they are concerned, but it is secure.

2. All folders point to whereever the opencart files are installed, so the other domains do not require folders. See http://forum.opencart.com/viewtopic.php?t=27538 on how to change the document route for the other shops.

3. I use separate theme folders for each store so I can change css, etc, easier, though I delete some templates such as product.tpl as I want them all to be the same (if a stores template doesn't have a certain file, it defaults to using the one in the default template folder, so I edit product.tpl in default and all my shops are the same for that page). I have .htaccess files in each folder to control access for security reasons.

daniel2008 wrote:

labeshops wrote:Take a look at mine in my signature. More than 30 stores running from 1 oc installation

Hi labeshops,

I'm very impressed by your successful works of multi-stores from one oc.

I have some questions for you after visiting some of your domains,

1. it seems that not all domains apply to ssl (https://) to complete a payment, why?

2. I know normally one store is put under the base of public_html folder.
Which folder will be held for the second domain?

3. Similar questions for themes and some important files such as .htaccess

Many Thanks

Daniel

1. I currently only have 1 ssl certificate as I don't have the budget for a multidomain one right now. It will be added in the future. (my former software was hacked last year so i'm still rebuilding - only have about 1/5th of my products online right now). It's on the installation domain, labeshops.com so technically since all shops run from that domain, they are secure, though the browser lock thing doesn't show. Anyone that asks, I tell them to check out thru Labeshops.com if they are concerned, but it is secure.

2. All folders point to whereever the opencart files are installed, so the other domains do not require folders. See http://forum.opencart.com/viewtopic.php?t=27538 on how to change the document route for the other shops.

3. I use separate theme folders for each store so I can change css, etc, easier, though I delete some templates such as product.tpl as I want them all to be the same (if a stores template doesn't have a certain file, it defaults to using the one in the default template folder, so I edit product.tpl in default and all my shops are the same for that page). Most of my stores use modified default template and a few other free ones - eventually all stores will be fancied up (my background is graphic design) but for now, getting products up and having the stores functional are my primary goals to build up sales. Then I'll get fancier I have .htaccess files in each folder to control access for security reasons.

1. I currently only have 1 ssl certificate as I don't have the budget for a multidomain one right now. It will be added in the future. (my former software was hacked last year so i'm still rebuilding - only have about 1/5th of my products online right now). It's on the installation domain, labeshops.com so technically since all shops run from that domain, they are secure, though the browser lock thing doesn't show. Anyone that asks, I tell them to check out thru Labeshops.com if they are concerned, but it is secure.

Hi labeshops,

Thank you for your reply.
If your were hacked before, was that because of SSL non-enforced on other domains?
If the clients can't see https:// on the browser, it's difficult to persuade them to believe
the website's security according to my experience. So no SSL is only your budget issue not
a special technical solution for the domain security.

As I'm planning to have another domain using the same OC database at the back, I'll
follow your suggestion and catch you later if I have other doubts.

Thanks again for your kind suggestions.

My former sites were not opencart and didn't have SSL at all - had nothing to do with SSL so not really understanding your question, sorry.

I had never messed with SSL before and still don't understand it totally, but I also offer Paypal standard as a payment option and allow people to call in their orders too, so have never had an issue.