Patent ID: 7634427

Claim:
An electronic commerce system, comprising: a host, configured for operation by a host owner, suitably adapted for two-way electronic communication between the host owner and a plurality of distributors, each of said plurality of distributors offering an electronic inventory of merchandise comprising discrete items, and said host suitably adapted to issue electronic orders to the plurality of distributors in response to purchase requests received; and a store builder web site suitably adapted to, in response to a request from a store owner during access to the web site, create an electronic store managed by the host for the store owner, said electronic store to provide each of a plurality of consumers with access, via said distributors, to at least one merchandise item selected from the inventory, the access comprising presentation on one or more web pages to each of the plurality of consumers at the time that the respective consumer accesses the electronic store, and the electronic store configured to support electronic order taking and transactional processing for a plurality of sales transactions directly between respective ones of the plurality of consumers and the store owner; and wherein the creation of the store comprises, during the access to the store builder web site by the store owner: receiving one or more selections from the store owner for customization of the appearance of the store; receiving a store name from the store owner; presenting to the store owner a plurality of store types for selection in building the store, each of the plurality of store types associated with a different product theme; receiving from the store owner an identification of a plurality of products to be offered in the store, at least a portion of the plurality of products to be presented to the store owner by the store builder web site for selection by the store owner; and receiving from the store owner a new URL for access to the store by each of the plurality of consumers.