Now at this point you have to remember that my day job is running large scale eCommerce businesses which sees me advising companies on what eCommerce platforms to use, the challenges of integration etc. I blog about hat too, on my other site, marcoryan.com.

So the cynics would say that I am pretty conditioned to claims by eCommerce companies and start-ups to have a “new way” or the “worlds best” or worst still, “a paradigm shift”! But Foxycart has really, really impressed me, and here’s why.

Simply put,  Foxycart is a completely hosted yet completely configurable eCommerce system that anyone – yes, really anyone – can set up and use. Designed by designers to be simple yet sophisticated. Its ease of integration , installation and configuration makes it a no brainer for any sole proprietor, NGO, small or medium size business. At its core is the idea that adding items to a cart and checking out should be simple – ideally on a single page and be supported by great communications to the customer –and all for a ridiculously cheap $19 a month. No contracts , no hidden charges, just pay as you go at $19 a month.

It is extremely easy to get started with – no need for expensive consultants or tecchies with a degree in astro-physics and a part time job with NASA!

You have full design control over all aspects of it (cart, checkout, receipts). It has the features you need (downloadables, security, saved accounts, subscriptions). Best of all, it’s not a bloated CMS. You can build products on-the-fly using very simple code. If you can add a link to your webpage, you can use foxycart. See, I told you it was simple!

This means you can use it easily on static pages, with pre-existing CMSs or WordPress. Sure if you want to customize  everything, then you may need some CSS knowledge, but for 99% of us the out of the box code is cut and paste.

There is a fabulous screencast of how to set it up with WordPress at  css tricks

Unfortunately I can’t give you a link yet to go and see what I have done, as the “Store” concerned is for a new not for profit foundation that I am involved in. But a great NGO called the Preemptive Love Coalition – http://www.preemptivelove.org – is using it, so stop by there, make a small $5 donation and check it out!

What does it offer:

• CSS + XHTML: use your existing templates. They’ll dynamically cache the whole thing at their end
• easy to implement: as easy as adding a link or form. great looking default styles. ecommerce in minutes.
• by web-developers, for web developers: finally, something built the way *you’d* build it.
• automatic shipping rates: get live rates from usps, or set your own on a per product/category basis.
• JSONP: want to get all web 2.0 on things? no problem. display your cart however you want.
• XML datafeeds: your sales = your data. get xml of your sales sent automatically for you to parse as you want. integrate foxycart with your existing systems.
• PLUS – and here is the great bit – support for aAll sorts of merchant gateways , including Paypal. This means you can offer credit cards and Paypal options at single product level.

Better yet you can play with the whole thing for free up until the point you want to post transactions, when the monthly fee kicks in.

Now, there were a few problems when I came to integrate it into GraphPaperPress’ modularity theme – but to be fair to Foxycart the issue was GPP’s not Foyxcart’s, yet it was Foxycart that helped me to debug the PhP and Javascript to make it work. For those of you using modularity who are interested then you can see the whole thing in next post!