by AncientSled » Wed Aug 21, 2019 12:37 am
Initially, it was a toss-up between Shopify and 3DCart...when it came down to it, my go-to supplier was already using Shopify, and so that was the deciding factor.
I've been with them for a couple of months now, and have been fairly pleased with the experience so far.
One of the things which has been on my radar, though, has been the various add-ons you can choose. (This one to customize your product fields, that one to offer subscriptions, and so on.) In some cases the 3rd party developers charge a flat monthly fee, while in others they may charge a percentage of your sales, or charge on a sliding scale based on your volume.
Given that my start-up is doing the best it can to keep overhead to a minimum, with the mandate of donating 80% of earnings before tax to charities and non-profits, the few dollars here and a % or so there can all add up very quickly, potentially chewing up the margins that you depend upon, whether for operations or donation, or making it necessary to increase your mark-up.
The system is flexible enough that you can have a dev person or team set up "Solution X" to meet your needs, and not be subjected to ongoing expenses, however in some cases you really do want to go with that 3rd party offering, for the support that they can provide. Since there are usually umpteen Apps to provide a specific nice-to-have function, do plenty of research beforehand -- dig into the reviews about the features, the usability, and the nature of support.