New site just stupid slow

I successfully transitioned my website from the desktop server to the live server; most of the kinks are worked out.

However my website (especially the main page) is incredibly slow. I'm talking 5-10 seconds to load once your on the page. Server Speed Test said it was off the charts.

https://www.tacticalimports.ca

I have followed the guide to speed things up and shaved some time off the load time; enough that Server Speed Test Would register 19 seconds. (My main focus is the main page at the moment; I only did image optimization for front page images). Front page size is only 720KB.

https://www.zen-cart.com/tutorials/index.php?article=21

The templated I used is very quick on the example server so I know its not the template itself. Template front page is actually larger at 793KB. Server Speed Test says 3.61 Seconds for template demo.

I am running a VPS; specs are as follows:
Dual Intel Xeon DUAL or QUAD CORE CPUs (Burst): 3.2GHz
Intel Xeon DUAL CORE CPU (Guaranteed): 1.5Ghz
RAM (Burst): 8GB
RAM (Guaranteed): 1GB

I talked to my host about optimizing the server to run the website (since that's its only function) and provided the Webserver Tips as seen below. They told me thy would look into it.
https://www.zen-cart.com/tutorials/index.php?article=287

I also checked out parse times I don't know what to compare these to to know if they are within normal ranges:
Main Page
Parse Time: 0.365 - Number of Queries: 159 - Query Time: 0.056272130645752
Product Listing 1
Parse Time: 0.382 - Number of Queries: 287 - Query Time: 0.07774410697937
Product Listing 2
Parse Time: 0.428 - Number of Queries: 393 - Query Time: 0.09003641267395
Product 1
Parse Time: 0.514 - Number of Queries: 252 - Query Time: 0.068596364135743
Product 2
Parse Time: 0.547 - Number of Queries: 252 - Query Time: 0.05991379675293

Do you guys have any ideas why the site is so slow?

nickorett:

I also checked out parse times I don't know what to compare these to to know if they are within normal ranges:
Main Page
Parse Time: 0.365 - Number of Queries: 159 - Query Time: 0.056272130645752
Product Listing 1
Parse Time: 0.382 - Number of Queries: 287 - Query Time: 0.07774410697937
Product Listing 2
Parse Time: 0.428 - Number of Queries: 393 - Query Time: 0.09003641267395
Product 1
Parse Time: 0.514 - Number of Queries: 252 - Query Time: 0.068596364135743
Product 2
Parse Time: 0.547 - Number of Queries: 252 - Query Time: 0.05991379675293
Those numbers show excellent performance of Zen Cart.

Your slowness is not in Zen Cart, but rather in the files you're downloading to the browser as part of your template and its resources. Some of the images in your template's background etc are taking long times to download from whatever server they're on.
You can see all the details using Firebug's network tab.

Have you tried switching your template to "Classic" and see what difference you see in the speed of pages being drawn? Sure you'll miss some features in the process, but you'll see quickly that the problem appears to be largely related to your template and not Zen Cart. You can of course switch back to your own template again after doing a brief test with Classic.

Wouldnt the speed of the demo template (3.6s vs my 19s) and the fact that the demo template is larger (demo template is 793KB vs my template is 720KB) rule out the template?

Demo template here:
livedemo00.template-help.com/zencart_35146/index.php

The template seller could have blazing fast servers, configured specially for their produucts' display. Who's your host ?

Your main page loaded here in <3 seconds, after I cleared the browser cache. Could be a routing issue wherever you are.

nickorett:

Wouldnt the speed of the demo template (3.6s vs my 19s) and the fact that the demo template is larger (demo template is 793KB vs my template is 720KB) rule out the template?

No. Did you even try my suggestion?

nickorett:

Demo template here:
livedemo00.template-help.com/zencart_35146/index.php

Besides, TemplateMonster templates are largely crap. I'm not surprised that you're having problems when using it.

700+ kb is waaaaay to big! You need to optimize your images, CSS and JavaScript.

stevesh:

The template seller could have blazing fast servers, configured specially for their produucts' display. Who's your host ?

Your main page loaded here in <3 seconds, after I cleared the browser cache. Could be a routing issue wherever you are.

Host is Webserve Canada.

That is interesting to know.

Loaded in four seconds for me on first visit, (nothing cached). Second visit, less than three.