I’m sure you are wondering which program really is the best consignment software? The Computer Peeps know how confusing it can be to make sure you purchase the right consignment software that matches your needs.
One thing to pay close attention to when purchasing consignment software, is that most of the major consignment vendors claim to be the best consignment shop software on the market. What you read isn’t always true, and what your friend says is the best consignment software, might not be the best consignment software for you.
It’s true, most of the consignment software programs offer similar features, but what you should keep in mind is how the consignment program feels when you are using it. You wouldn’t buy a car just because your friend said it drives nice! More importantly, you wouldn’t buy a car just because it’s pretty! My point is before you buy software you need to demo, demo, and do more demoing!
Also, specific features. Make sure you verify if the software handles any unique needs for your consignment store – e.g. flat rate buyer/item fees vs. percentage buyer fees, etc.
Make sure you really kick the tires @ adding items, ringing up sales, and paying out consignors. You want to have practiced the actual processes you go through on a daily basis, within the software you’re about to invest in. Don’t add items and practice paying out consignors on the day you actually need add inventory or pay consignors. You get a free trial with each of these programs and you can take a consigned item all the way through the complete consignment life cycle, before you decide to purchase your consignment software.
So no, there is not “one” best consignment shop software. It truly all comes down to which program offers you the specific features you need, and which program feels the most usable!
The Computer Peeps would love to answer any additional questions you might have about the various consignment software programs on the market. We are experts in the industry and no one knows consignment software and consignment hardware the way we do!
Hello. I’m using Consignment Success for 4 years and I’m very happy with the program, but now i’m expanding my business and i need to work with 3 or more computers accessing at the same time. With Consignment Success i have 2 licenses, and when i used the computer that access the main computer it’s very slow to add inventory or edit something. I’m considering to change to Liberty 4, like i said, i’m really comfortable with Consignment Success but i think Liberty 4 can support many computers at a time without a problem because is made it with SQL. What do you think? Thanks for your comments.
Hi Tomas,
Thanks for posting on our blog! Consignment Ease and Consignment Success suffer from the same issues that all non-server/client RDBMSes suffer from – performance and stability issues. Success uses dBase/FoxPro (.dbf) files. On day 1, the program will perform quite well. As more data is added on or if you add additional workstations to connected to the shared folder on the server where the data files reside, you will begin to see LONG delays when loading the program, or navigating from screen to screen.
Moving to Gigabit Ethernet can help, if you’re on a 10 or 100 Mbps network, but the application doesn’t actually send that much data across the network. The issue is many-fold and it all boils down to the type of database management system, or lack thereof, that is used for applications that utilize dBase or FoxPro.
You will never see a company say, “We need a database management system that scales up from 10-100 users – let’s use dBase!”
So if you’re at the point where you have 3+ systems and potentially will have more in the future (along with more inventory, more sales, more consignors, etc.) then you need a database management system that can actually handle that volume.
We’re open Monday-Friday from 10AM-5PM and on Saturdays from 12PM-4PM. We offer a free 30-consultation and we can discuss all of your options. Let me know if you have any additional questions!