Simply The Best Toys and Gifts review for Shop By Brand

March 2, 2020

So - before I heartily recommend this app, a little piece of history. I created my own 'Brand' page before this app came along. At the time I was running a purely Fair Trade store, with a limited number of small 'Producers', which I put in the 'Vendor' field - and which I classed as a 'Brand'. This page displayed a list of Collection pages; one for each 'Producer' (or 'Brand'). These I had to generate myself, with an auto-populate of 'Vendor'. Once I had a Collection page for each Brand, I then needed to add a box for each Brand, on the overall 'Producers Page', which would display a logo and a link to the Collection page. That's now history. While it worked very well, every time I got a new 'Producer', I would have to update my Collection pages and Producers Page code..... As I'm expanding and adding more real 'Brands' on a weekly basis (lots more toys and geeky stuff), it's become a headache updating this. As if there wasn't enough to do, running a shop and an online store.... And then along came 'Shop By Brand'. Essentially, it does everything that my code did (and more) - *Automagically*. Whenever a new 'Brand' is added - a Brand is added to the list. There's a central admin page for the Brands, where each may be edited individually with a brief description, logo, URL for link out to their website or another place of your choosing...once this info has been set up, everything else 'just happens'. A page of all brands *available online* is generated, with the above info - and a link to a search page (essentially a 'Collection' page) for that Brand. Instead of having to add code, all that needs to be done is populate a handful of fields with esential info for a new Brand - and everything is there. With our expansion, once I bring all products online, we'll have around 250 Brands (way too many for my 'solution'). I've had a word with Jarvis, a very friendly and approachable chap, and he says that won't pose a problem - pagination is on the way. I've also suggested a handful of features I think would improve the app - again, they are already 'in hand' and will be rolled out as and when they can be - number of subscribers permitting, I would imagine. The bottom line - this is a great app as it stands, if you want to offer the facility for a simple click to showcase products from your brands. Yes, this can be achieved in other ways - but this app 'has it all', without having to remember to add in new Collection pages and code. It's elegant and just works. And it's only going to get better :-) I only use apps I think will enhance my store - and this is a prime example.