Multiple Merchants Sharing A Single Zen Cart Installation

I'm considering using Zen Cart for an e-commerce site for a farmers' cooperative. They would like individual "stores" for each of the cooperative members, but they want to share product categories, payment processing and fulfillment functions within the co-op (along with a search engine). Can Zen Cart do this, where I can design specific templates for each co-op member and an overall design for the cart for the group?

They plan to use PayPal for payment processing, but they may want to start the store with payment options disabled for a few months until we can get all the members and their products loaded into the cart. Can I use the cataloging features without turning on payment processing in Zen Cart?

Thank you so much for any help you can provide. I have used Miva for e-commerce in the past, but they are unsuited for this project.

Thank you!

David Biddix

There is the Multi-site Module addon for Zen Cart which may enable you to do what you want. (in Free Addons)

Payment processing setup is separate from pricing display or showcase setup.

They would like individual "stores" for each of the cooperative members, but they want to share product categories, payment processing and fulfillment functions within the co-op (along with a search engine). Can Zen Cart do this, where I can design specific templates for each co-op member and an overall design for the cart for the group?
ZenCart is not designed to be a "Mall" script to sell multiple individuals items

These are individual stores only in the sense that they are members of the cooperative. They just want a different look and feel, but they want to use a common payment processing and search engine for all members.

Also, they want to load the site and leave payments disabled for a short time until we get everyone moved in. Can this be done in Zen Cart?

Thanks again for your help!

These are individual stores only in the sense that they are members of the cooperative.

The module gjh42 referenced can do individual sites but only allows ONE administrative portal where all can be managed

Being a 3rd party contributed module, It also does not have active support

So each store would have to log in to the administrative control panel to add products? Or can they do tthat from somewhere else?

So each store would have to log in to the administrative control panel to add products?
Correct and there is only one of these with the capability of multiple store fronts
Either as seperate domains names or as sub-domains of one

Yes, they would all have to log in to the central admin. Each could have their own admin username so activity could be tracked, and the Admin Profiles mod can limit some of them to certain functions, but it cannot limit by individual category or product.

Thank you both for your help. I am intrigued by the possibilities of the plug-in. I haven't found any other shopping cart that comes close to supporting my multiple stores format.

If the coop members all know and trust each other, it may be usable for you even without the rigid separation of store products.