Free CRM for solo distributors: what you get with Vital Registry.

The "free CRM" problem

If you search for free CRM software, you will find no shortage of options. HubSpot Free, Zoho Free, Freshsales Free. They all look compelling in the feature list and considerably less compelling once you are inside the product and the upgrade prompts start appearing.

This is not a criticism — those products are well-built and their free tiers are genuinely useful for certain use cases. But the business model is clear: the free tier is a funnel into a paid subscription. The features you actually need as an active user tend to be just above the paywall.

Vital Registry is structured differently, and this article explains exactly what that means for you as a solo distributor.

What you get — the complete feature list

There is no paid tier. There is no trial that expires. There is no feature gating. Here is what every Vital Registry user gets from day one:

Device management

• Unlimited device records with serial numbers, device types, and status tracking
• Device types optimised for BEMER equipment (Pro, Pro Plus, Spot Stim, Vet Pro, control units) — other device types can be added
• Filter by availability, type, and assigned partner
• Full audit trail of which client has had each device and when

Client management

• Unlimited client profiles with contact details, addresses, and VAT numbers
• Client types: private individual, company, B2B partner
• Full rental and payment history per client
• Prospect tracking for leads who have not yet confirmed a rental

Rental management

• Rental records with start/end dates, monthly fees, and payment schedules
• Automatic overlap detection — the system blocks double-booking at the data layer
• B2B partner envelope enforcement — sub-distributor rentals cannot extend beyond the partner's own contract period
• Open-ended rentals supported (no fixed end date)

Contract generation

• PDF contract generation from rental data in one click
• Editable templates with your own clauses, header, and terms
• B2C and B2B contract variants
• Contract attachment storage — signed PDFs attached directly to rental records

Calendar and timeline

• Calendar view of active rentals
• Gantt chart showing all active rentals on a timeline
• Expiry warnings for upcoming rental end dates

Payments and reporting

• Payment logging per rental (amount, date, method)
• Per-client payment history and outstanding balance view
• CSV export of all rental and payment data
• Annual summaries suitable for accountant handoff

Why is it actually free?

Vital Registry was built by an independent BEMER distributor for other independent BEMER distributors. It is not a VC-backed startup with a growth-at-all-costs mandate and an eventual monetisation event on the roadmap. It is software built to solve a specific problem that its creator had, shared with others who have the same problem.

The infrastructure costs — Firebase hosting, Firestore database, cloud functions — are real but modest for the scale of a tool serving hundreds of distributors rather than millions of enterprise users. Those costs are covered by voluntary support from users who find the software valuable.

This is why the support page exists. If you use Vital Registry regularly and it saves you meaningful time each month, you can choose to contribute toward keeping it running and funded for future development. But you are not required to. The full product works without it.

What free means in practice

Free means you sign up, enter your first device, create your first client profile, and record your first rental — all without entering payment details or agreeing to a trial clock that starts ticking.

Free means that in six months, when your rental volume has grown and you are relying on the system daily, nothing changes. The product does not suddenly require an upgrade. You do not hit a record limit. The features you depend on do not get moved to a paid tier in the next product update.

Free means your accountant can have the CSV export every month without you having to check whether that feature is available on your current plan.

What Vital Registry is not

It is worth being clear about the boundaries:

• Not an invoicing tool. Vital Registry tracks what was agreed and what was paid, but it does not generate tax invoices or receipts. Use your local invoicing software for that.
• Not a general-purpose CRM. It is purpose-built for rental and sales management of medical devices, primarily BEMER equipment. The field structure, the overlap detection logic, and the contract templates all reflect that specific use case. If you are managing a different kind of business, a general-purpose CRM will serve you better.
• Not enterprise software. There is no multi-user team management, no role-based access control, no API. It is designed for solo operators and small offices — typically one to three people working on the same account.

Getting started

Sign up at vital-registry.com. The onboarding takes about 10 minutes for your first real rental. Add your devices, create a client, record a rental, generate a contract — the flow is designed to be obvious even if you have never used a CRM before.

If you run into anything that does not work the way you expect, email vitalregistrysupport@gmail.com. The team is small and responsive.

And if you decide after a few months that Vital Registry genuinely saves you time and you want to say thank you, the support page is the place to do it.