Hello-
Have a small employee base (35). Is there a magical number range for implementing an LMS? Any suggestions on effective LMS's for this size and at a reasonable cost? Thanks for your thoughts.

Depends a lot on what your company's goals are for having an LMS and for tracking particular learning information in the first place, how many people you have to support that effort, what technology your company is willing to budget for (and support), how much you think your company will grow... etc. etc. etc...

in short - too many variables to provide a number. Your current size of 35 is pretty small -- most likely doable with a basic database (e.g. Access) or use of a free LMS (cannot remember the name of it at the moment).

JMO, YMMV

There are no magic numbers for when to start using an LMS. If you need to have legal requirements to record training it could be justification to use a system sooner than a company that only needs to do new hire training. What it all comes down to is how much training do you need to have users take, how often you need to train them, and at what point does it make sense to use a system to help automated much of that process.

The big open source LMS is Moodle ( http://www.moodle.org ). Although you don’t have to pay licensing fees to use this system, keep in mind that it takes a lot to create a reliable production ready system. My company provides a low cost hosted Moodle solution that provides a production ready system that I would be happy to demo it for you.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions.

Moodle! Thanks MIchael! I knew there was some free LMS out there - just could not think of the name.

As far as moodle.. be careful it is NOT FREE, but has no licensing costs. My years of experience and discussions with many moodle users is that it in facts costs more than the low costs LMS's.. so buyer beware..
As far as the initial question, Michael gave good advice, there is more to it though.. Since you have 35 people, what does it cost you to train them? Or if you are not training them, what does that cost you (i.e. a smart person once stated if you think training costs you a lot, try ignorance a while.. <grin>
Let's say because the 35 people are geographically dispersed, training costs you quite a bit in travel expenses.. an LMS would in fact be justified to save those travel expenses. Or even if all in one spot, what is the cost saving if we do not have a dedicated person doing all the Instructor Led? Could that persons time be applied elsewhere? What would be the costs saving. Then as good as an instructor is, how important is it to get consistent training done (a for sure with eLearning and not so sure with Instructor Led), and what about the aspect of not having to take people off the job to get trained but with eLearning allowing them to use the breaks, and slow periods of their jobs to get training as opposed to taking them off the job?
I would be happy to discuss with you (no I do NOT charge for that) and share my 20+ years experience with eLearning with you.. email me at scase@aleragroup.com
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Profile; http://www.linkedin.com/pub/steve-case/3/41b/7a0