>Right, I understand. But does that mean it has to always be that way? I understand that sometimes changing a system can be expensive, so I'll just ask it as a question.

The proper way would be how I did in the other systems. Make and Model are tables with the choices. Integers are used in the main tables and searches are done in the integer, by the use of dropdown list and this is highly optimizable.

I will revise what you said however about going back to the LIKE usage. There has been some time since this was changed and I would like to make sure if I can simulate that again to see if using LIKE would be a go or a no go.

>I've had experience with this - I've had to modify CRM databases to undo years of misspellings and incorrect entries, to create a clean database going forward. It took a few months and cost more than we initially estimated. But the system was much better in the long run. Just something to think about. I don't have a good answer for the initial problem (though I think you want to reconsider updating DB stats), so this is the only thing I can contribute. Again, maybe someone else can jump in if they have additional thoughts.

Thanks