FW Virtuemart Rental is a Joomla plugin that allows you not only to sell but also to rent out the objects. In the article, we will consider the features and advantages of this extension, describe its installation and configuration.
Joomla virtuemart rent is a plugin for creating an online store based on Joomla virtuemart. It provides an opportunity for goods advanced configuration: price changes depending on the rental periods, stock balances control, etc. The review will help developers with this plugin installation, and site owners with an understanding of the main features and benefits.
Key features
Simple integration with Virtuemart the plugin is built into the payment unit. Works as a custom field where it is possible to define appearance, price, etc.
Advanced price grid allows the user to arrange by periods a rental period. Depending on them, recalculation will take place.
Stock Control Joomla virtuemart template keeps track of booked and rented items, leaving on the site only those that are in stock.
All the possibilities of the Joomla Virtuemart product
As the plugin is obtained as a convenient addition, it does not have many features. But they all play an important role:
- Rent and sale option. You can not only sell but also rent your goods. The system takes into consideration all rented goods as unavailable in stock.
- Individual settings. There is no common template for all products. You can set up each trade item separately.
- Deposit. If necessary, you can take a deposit by renting the goods.
- Booking delay. The plugin includes situations when a product requires prior preparation and booking.
- Adaptive date format. The date is shown in the format of the country in which the user is located.
Plugin installation
If you want to look at the possibilities of the plugin before installation, this can be done by using the Joomla virtuemart demo. The site shows all possibilities of extension.
If you have any questions, you can contact the technical support or read the Joomla virtuemart rental tutorial. What is required for installation:
- Log into your administrator panel using your credentials.
- Select “Extensions” in the top menu of the admin panel and click on it.
- Select “Manage”, then “Install” menu items.
- Download the zip file in any convenient way.
If the installation is done correctly, you will see the corresponding green notification. What to do after installation:
- Find “Extensions” in the top menu.
- Select “Plugins”. FW Virtuemart Rental should be in the list of plugins.
- Select it using the check mark and turn it on with the button in the top left section of the screen.
Now the plugin is completely ready to work. You can begin to fill the site with content. Joomla virtuemart show all products is obtained in two versions: annual subscription and one-off payment.
Conclusion
All the things needed to provide services for the goods rent are implemented in FW Virtuemart Rental. You can customize each item separately, take a deposit, adjust a price based on rental period.
Useful features combined with simple installation and configuration make this plugin useful for rental sites.
In this release, we have focused on the Booking form design. We have also implemented a set of updates and bugfixes. Let’s review all the changes below:
- New Booking form design. We have improved the design of the Booking form to make it more understandable and user-friendly. The form has been divided into several separate sections and highlighted with blue color for better visual presentation and positive user experience.
- New plugin parameter Deposit HTML Description. We have added Deposit HTML Description parameter to the Booking form. Now if you have specific deposit terms you can specify them via this parameter.
- New plugin parameter Insurance HTML Description. We have added Insurance HTML Description parameter to the Booking form. Now if you have specific insurance terms you can specify them via this parameter.
- Optional Font Awesome load parameter. This parameter allows/blocks font Awesome uploading. Set this parameter depending on whether font Awesome is included in the template or not.
- Language constants review and translation fix. We have updatedlanguage files to fix some missing translations.
- All calculated parameters are visible on the Booking form. We have made all calculations transparent for you.
- Rental values get recalculated. Now as the user changes the dates the values get recalculated.
- Active pricing layer is highlighted. We have highlighted the active layer in the pricing section with blue color to bring more clarity to the price calculation.
Get familiar with FW VirtueMart Rental documentation to find more information about FW VirtueMart Rental. Please use the comments section at the bottom of each documentation page to comment and suggest improvements that will make the product experience better.
In this release, we have done a few bugfixes and updates to improve user experience with FW VirtueMart Rental. Let’s review all of the changes below:
- Layout styles update. We have removed some Booking form display failures, which resulted from previous totalBooking form design update.
- Rental price is 0 when the form is empty. Even though the dates are not chosen within the calendars, the total rental price is displayed as “0”. This feature brings more clarity to the price calculation process.
- Total price includes deposit price. Now if the dates are selected deposit price will be included in the total rental price.
- Deposit and Insurance fields display. Bug resulted in system titles display on the front-end. Now deposit and Insurance fields are displayed as text areas.
Get familiar with FW VirtueMart Rental documentation to find more information about FW VirtueMart Rental. Please use the comments section at the bottom of each documentation page to comment and suggest improvements that will make the product experience better.
In this release, we have implemented several important functionalities allowing for better product usability. Let’s review all of them below:
- Booking form display in different positions. Earlier, the only obligatory term was to set an “addtocart” position for a booking form, otherwise, it didn’t work. Now it is possible to assign a few extra positions to the booking form - ontop, normal and onbot. As a result, you have more options for positioning the booking form in your template.
- Total rental price and stock details on the category page. Earlier, the total rental price and stock details displayed only on the individual product page. Now this information can be displayed on the category page. This feature allows to quickly scan through all total rental prices and stock number and choose the product you need to add it to cart. This feature works in pair with FW VM Rental Dates Module. If the FW VM Rental Dates Module is displayed, you can specify the rental dates in the module fields, and all products available for the specified rental period will be displayed on the category page along with calculated total rental prices and stock details.
- Calendar translation. Now the booking calendars can be translated to different languages. The language of the calendars depends on your website language so if your website language is French, the calendar gets automatically translated to French, and there is no need for any specific configuration.
Get familiar with FW VirtueMart Rental documentation to find more information about our product. Please use the comments section at the bottom of each documentation page to comment and suggest improvements that will make the product experience better.
In this release, we implemented two significant features dedicated to boost user experience by enabling fast booking and stock control at the checkout stage. Let’s review them in details below:
Add to cart button on category page
Sometimes, bookings are made very quickly. For this particular case, we have implemented a new feature - add to cart button to the category page. This feature allows to simplify booking procedure to the extent. The Add to cart button on the products category page allows to submit bookings right on the category page without going to the details page where all calculations and pricing terms are specified. Once the button is clicked, you can go to the cart and submit the order.
Stock control at checkout
Earlier FW VM Rental plugin allowed to verify products availability during monitoring and booking stages only. However, sometimes products quantity can be adjusted at the checkout stage, which may lead to ordering one and the same product several times for the same dates. To solve this issue, we present a new solution to stock control functionality. Now, the number of products available in stock is verified at the checkout stage. If the number of products is changed at the checkout stage and exceeds the stock number, this number is automatically adjusted to the number of products available in stock. In other words, the customer won’t be able to book more than available in stock.
However, when a product is booked, it doesn’t mean it is shipped. For that reason, to avoid situations when one and the same product is booked several times, the plugin allows blocking the product that has already been booked.
Get familiar with
FWVM Rental documentation to find more information about our product. Please use the comments section at the bottom of each documentation page to comment and suggest improvements that will make the product experience better.
This release introduces a new feature - discount prices. Offering discounts is a sure way to increase sales multifold. So we assume that this new feature will have a positive impact on user experience.
Our new discount prices functionality allows to set a dynamic discount pricing via the pricing grind. Offer discount amount for each rental term within the grid and let your customers make their choice. As a result, the total rental amount gets calculated based on the pricing term and a discount price specified for this particular term.
Discount terms are visible on the booking form in the separate column within the pricing grid. The old price is shown as crossed and a new price is highlighted with red color. You will also see a total discount amount next to the total rental price.
Get familiar with
FW VM Rental documentation to find more information about our product. Please use the comments section at the bottom of each documentation page to comment and suggest improvements that will make the product experience better.
In this article, we will review a showcase dedicated to kids rentals - baby carriage rentals. Based on the showcase, we will highlight the following features - group rentals, category price and stock, and pricing grid.
However, before to get into details, make sure that your Joomla website is preinstalled with VirtueMart component and FW VirtueMart Rental Plugin. This is a key requirement to get started with FW VirtueMart Rental Plugin. To learn how to get started with FW VirtueMart Rental Plugin, review
Getting started documentation page. If your have Virtuemart component and FW VirtueMart Rental Plugin in place, it takes around one hour to create a similar website. The overall process for creating such a website looks as follows:
- Create a product category to show rental business direction and its respective products.
- Add products to the newly created category.
- Display a category to show products, their pricing terms, deposit/insurance information, and available quantity.
- Configure the FW VM Rental Dates Module to allow for package rent.
Check out our Baby carriage rentals guide to learn how to configure every page of Outdoor gear rentals showcase. Now let’s review the key features and benefits below.
Group rentals
Once a category is created and products are added to the category, it is time to configure Rental Dates module. Rental Dates module allows to simplify package rent when a bunch of products are rented for the same dates. If you specify the pickup and return dates in the calendars, all baby carriages falling under this period will be displayed on the category page. See the screenshot below.
Category price and stock
Rental Dates module works in pair with category price and stock functionality. When rental dates are entered within the module calendars, all products available for the same dates appear on the category page along with calculated total rental price and stock quantity. Thus, as we enter the rental period for the baby carriage category, all baby carriages available for the specified period will be displayed on the category page, along with calculated total rental price and stock number. This feature can be handy on the initial screening stage. See the screenshot below to see how it is displayed.
Pricing grid
If the price and stock number fits your needs, you can go to the individual product page to get into the details. On the individual product page, there is a tiered pricing table showing different prices with regard to different rental terms. It helps to see how the total rental price was calculated.
FW VM Rental Plugin is a ready-made solution for your Joomla VirtueMart website. A transparent and easy-to-use booking form shows how the price is calculated and what’s included in the price. Except for the package rent, category price/stock functionality, and tiered pricing, it features plain booking calendars, insurance/deposit functionality, stock control, and many more. Get familiar with
FW VM Rental documentation to find more information about our product.
For many business owners getting a rental website with a booking functionality can be tricky, but we will show it is not. In this article, we will review a common Party Rental website with booking service created with
FW Virtuemart Rental. You can see the final result at
Party rentals on demo.
Reading time: 10 mins.
Implementation time: 35 mins.
With the right tool creating a similar rental website is easier than ever. Our party rental website provides the following benefits:
- Easy bookings via Transparent and informative booking form.
- Quick package rentals via Rental Dates Module allowing for booking multiple products at the same time.
- Reliable stock control with stock indicators and low stock notifications.
- Flexible pricing terms via a pricing grid.
- Discount pricing via a pricing grid allowing to show original and discount prices.
Renting out party equipment is one of the most popular rental business ideas. To give it a successful start, you need to get a basic website going. FW Virtuemart Rental Plugin is a ready-made solution for your Joomla VirtueMart website. The key requirement for getting started with FW Virtuemart Rental is making sure that your Joomla website is pre-installed with VirtueMart component.
Documentation reference: Getting started documentation page.
If your have VirtueMart component and FW Virtuemart Rental Plugin in place, it takes around 35 mins to set up similar rental functionality on your website. The overall configuration process is as follows:
- Create a parent category with child categories to show different rental services on offer and respective products within each child category.
- Add and configure products. Set up pricing terms, discount pricing, insurance/deposit functionality, etc.
- Display a category to show products on your Joomla VirtueMart website.
- Configure FW VM Rental Dates Module to allow for package rent.
Check out our Party rentals guide to learn how to configure every page of Party Rentals showcase. Now let’s review the key features and benefits below.
Page with party rental categories
You can break your rental services by events - birthdays, weddings, corporate meetings, etc., or by product types bars, furniture, cooking. In our showcase, we created a separate category for each product type. Let’s review the following elements of this page below:
- Rental Dates module section. If your customers need to book multiple products for the same dates, they can enter these dates into the Pickup date/Return date fields of the Rental Dates module and see which products are available for the specified dates by going to the needed category.
- Categories list. Add as many categories as it is determined by your business model.
- Category title. Simple and concise title of the category so your customers could easily navigate to a required category.
- Category image. Upload category image to present it on the page.
Page with party rental category
On this page you can see products belonging to a single category. The dates in the Rental Dates module are already pre-filled, total rental prices are already calculated with regard to these dates, and stock number is displayed for each product. Let’s review the following elements below:
- Rental Dates module. If you specify rental dates on the page with multiple categories, they get pre-filled on this page. However, you can enter rental dates right here, on the category page.
- Total rental price. The total rental price calculated with regard to the rental period indicated via Rental Dates module.
- Stock control indicator. Signifies about stock sufficiency/insufficiency with green/red color.
- Stock quantity. A number of products available in stock.
- Add to cart button. Click this button to proceed directly to the checkout stage, without getting into the details of the rental deal.
- Product details. Click this button to get into the details of the rental deal - calculations, pricing terms, discount details, deposit/insurance rates, etc.
Product page
On the product page you can view a booking form showing all the details of the rental deal - rental terms, calculations, insurance/deposit amounts, maximum allowed period, etc. You can also set discount prices for a product. Let’s review discount pricing elements in the screenshot below. The concept of the booking form is transparency and ease of use. You can change the rental terms right on the product page if it is needed.
- Discount pricing terms. The original price is shown as crossed and discount price is highlighted with red.
- Total rental price with a discount. Total rental price is shown along with the discount amount.
FW Virtuemart Rental Plugin is a sound solution for your party rentals business. If you like the concept of the showcase, you can create a similar one with your own hands. We clearly outlined all steps for adding rental functionality in our Party Rentals guide. Get familiar with
FWVM Rental documentation to find more information about our product.
