[GreenIslandDist]

Hi all,

I was wondering if someone could point me in the right direction with creating a database of products (ie a product catelogue) that could be formatted for easy implementation to a web site. I plan on outsourcing the actual website design using elance but I need to create a database of products to start.

Right now, I have everything in separate word files for each product (don't ask why) and I want the database organized into subsections a la subcategories such as growing media -> peat moss -> ProMix -> ProMix X2, with brief descriptions for each separate category as well as individual product descriptions. Our products vary widely with some having simple bullet points for applications to others having a list of varied dimensions and pictures.

Is there an easy to use/learn software package I could use to enter all of this data in or am I better off making one big excel file and then outsourcing the actual database creation part.(If so, how would I implement pictures into excel?)

I want to keep costs as low as possible with the site being easy to update / add products. Any help or ideas on how to go about this would be greatly appreciated.

[pgo]

Most web databases are in SQL. So, either learn SQL or outsource to someone who does know SQL.

Excel would be a fine place for a developer to start building a database from, but an Excel spreadsheet is not a relational database management system like SQL.

[GreenIslandDist]

Thanks for your response but I am still not sure whether it would be worth my time to learn SQL in order to put all of products into a database rather than just in excel. What would we looking to pay if we had our data from excel put into a database using SQL by someone who is familiar with the language.

If it is worth it to learn SQL, is there a really useful book or website that can teach me how to use it in a relatively short amount of time. I know a little html but not that much at all.

Our data might also present some problems with copying it over to excel or a databse. For instance, we have a bullet point list of components for several products... is it possible to transfer over lists like that into excel or an SQL database?

Appreciate the help guys...

[datahound]

If you use a shopping cart like Cubecart (Google it) you can create an inventory, you can then find a designer who can style the shop to look the way you want.

The details field in the Cubecart admin will allow you to paste the bullets etc.

If you want I can set up a demo of cubecart and you can look over it to see if it fits your requirement, PM me.

Cubecart sits on top of mySQL so if you input all your data you can move into another system later but Cubecart is pretty nifty shop.