I'd like to use checkboxes rather than drop down menus for the variants on several of the products on my site.
I have some items that you can buy one or more of a bunch of accessories or replacement parts and drop downs just dont make sence since it only lets you choose one or another.

Raptor, I think the only way you would be able to accomplish this would be through personalizations. However that probably wont help you if you need the prices to change for each item selected. I've run into a similar problem before. Could you send me a link so I can see. Maybe I could figure out a workaround for you.

Justyn

You got this item here http://allstatemedical.com/index.asp?PageA...D&ProdID=48 which is a hospitol bed for heavy people. I'd like it if our customers can choose, lets say, guard rails and bed ends. (i haven't added those items but they would go under additional accessories)

Or lets say, this item http://allstatemedical.com/index.asp?PageA...D&ProdID=54 (helps tranfer heavy patients) Usualy when you buy this item, You'd buy it with several slings in various sizes. with the drop down you can only choose one or another. Of course, you can go directly to the page with slings and buy whichever sling you want and keep coming back to that page if you want more or a different kind. but that kinda sounds like a hassle, and the whole point of our site is to make it easier for our customers to place orders.

the only other way i can think of is to make a variant group for each item with a add/dont add option. but that's kinda lame, and probably annoying for customers.

I dont know. If you can figure it out i'd appreciate it.

btw, whats your site? i'd like to take a look at what you ended up doing with it.

Raptor,

I checked out your site (btw it looks awesome). I see your delima. I wanted to do the same thing when we started our site (www.agkits.com). Certain engine kits that we sell we wanted to give the customer the option to add additonal parts to the kit. It can simply be done in the personalization options, but the prices can't be changed! It drove me nuts for a while until I had to settle with the variant option on some products. Yes if you want to add...No if you dont. (Yes "kinda lame")

Justyn

Justyn,

I was looking through your site for a while, i gotta say, i got a lot to learn from it. but i'l get to that soon.

An idea poped into my head about this variant issue, and i think it just might work. On items like the bed i showed you, or in your case, some kits that you can buy with extra parts. I can create a seperate catagory and put in there all the parts that can go for that item. I can then hide that catagory from the cat listings, and just add a link on the product page that says something like.. for a full list of parts for this item bla bla bla click here.
I guess that means you'd have to create lisings for all those items which could be a real pain. damn, for a seconed there i thought i had a good idea goin. hey atleast to the customer it looks better than 30 yes/no questions like taking a survey. .

Anyhow, back to your site. A few things i saw on your site reminded me of things i almost shot myself trying to do and i was hoping you can tel me how you did it.

1. When related items are available, and ONLY then, the title "may we recommend..." comes up. I set up my product page in Dreamweaver using the function calls available in the Product Details Editor. when i added a title for the related items, the title was there wether a related item is listed for it or not. It looked sorta lame the tittle being there on all the items when so far i only related a few items. So... i was hoping youc an tell me how you got it to show up only when you have related items.

2. Whatever i did, I could not figure out how to customize the image gallery. I was trying to customize the look and feel of the gallery when it pops up, and if there are no images to show it should say something like not available or whatever. The only thing close to it that i can find is "Product Gallery HTML Editor" which only lets me add stuff to the top and bottom of whatever is in the gallery. also i used the function call "DRAWPRODUCTIMAGEGALLERYLOCATION" and put it behind the function call for the thumbnail image. now if there is no image, it just goes to the homepage when you click on it rather than opening the gallery saying that something something not available or whatever.

I should mention that im not a programmer, I am technicaly a designer. I was doing Print Publishing for about 5 years before i was pulled into doing Web Design about a year ago. I learned alot but im not %100 all there when it comes to html or even web marketing. I'm pretty much learning as i go along. I pretty much grasp the consept and can understand basic functions but couldn't write it.

Anyhow, Im blabbin. Look at this i wrote a whole frieken book here. I should stop here.

Anyhow let me know what you thnk of the thing with the catagory for the variants and if you can tell me how you did those things i mentioned earlier. Thanks Justyn.

Dave