The theme of this year’s Miva Merchant conference, while somewhat cheesy, couldn’t have been more appropriate. Less than six months ago, we were seriously considering finding another e-commerce platform. Just to give you an idea of how big of a deal that is, MC2 has been working with Miva Merchant since 1998. For those of you who are mathematically challenged, that’s ten years! In computer years, that is a lifetime.
Back…
To explain why “Back to the Future” was such an appropriate theme for the conference, let me give you some background. For those of you who aren’t aware, FindWhat.com, a search-marketing focused company, purchased Miva Merchant in 2004. They made a few good moves at first, acquiring MVCool and re-branding it as MivaCentral as well as releasing Miva Merchant 5, but for the next few years they seemed to basically run Merchant into the ground. They alienated module developers, outsourced support, and almost destroyed the community that made it such a success in the first place.
…to the Future
In August of 2007, it was announced that Miva Merchant had been purchased from FindWhat.com (now Miva, Inc) by several of the management team who had worked so hard to make the product a success in the past. Within a month, the new team managed to bring tech support back in-house and drop-kicked the ridiculous outsourced design services that had pissed off the community so much.
The conference? I’m getting to it!
My cohort and I arrived in San Diego Thursday night after a whopping hour on a Southwest flight from Sacramento. After getting our rental car and checking in to the hotel, we headed down to the beach and hung out just long enough for me decide we need to open an MC2 Design, San Diego division and then were off to Thursday night’s mixer where we were given not only a whole bag of schwag, but also free beer and a chance to meet the infamous Baron Bob.
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