Choice of retail systems

As a retailer you have a need for some kind of till. There are a wide range of solutions to choose from, at an even wider range of prices. Before you start thinking about exactly which software or hardware is suitable, you need to consider the various levels of retail solution available to you. Do you want a till? Do you need to select an EPOS system? Do you want a stock management system? I’ve tried to broadly categorise the different types of route you can take to arm your business with the retail management/tilling system which it needs.

A manual system

The simplest, and probably least sophisticated solution is a completely manual system. Buy yourself a receipt pad and a biscuit tin. If customer want a receipt then write them one out in the receipt book. Put the cash in the biscuit tin. Even day, or couple of days, count up the cash, fill in your banking deposit slip, and bank the cash and cheques. This is about as basic as you can get an have any chance of running a retail business. You can add up the stubs on the bank book and work out your VAT/ Goods tax and take a guess at your sales.

Your accountant will laugh, your bank manager will laugh and the auditors will probably give you a very grim look. The only time you’ll be able to report on your profitability is once a year when you had your account a bunch of purchase invoices and the cash book.

Yes, it will work, but it will seriously cramp your ability to tactically and stragically manage your retail business.

This whole system can be setup for about £10. The amount of time it will cost you will not be easily measured.

An electronic cash register.

A simple electronic cash register will start at around £100 and go up to around £2000.

The different costs reflect the varying levels of hardware and functionality. At the low end, you can simple enter the prices and print a receipt and perform some rudimentary cashing up. Collect together the Z reads at the end of each day, and you’ve got enough to hand to the accountant.

At the top end, you can have touch screens, multiple programmable keys etc. You will be able to enter PLU or SKU records into the cash register and scan the items to sell them. Various hospitality and niche functions also start to appear such as controlling tables and layaways.

However, all data entry will have to be done into the ECR using the keyboard and possibly a barcode scanner. Remember: A barcode scanner is always going to be an extra cost. Usually starting at £80.

As the cost goes up, the reporting goes up. However, don’t expect any meaningful profitability reporting. However, the large majority of retail businesses up to around the £500k-£1m turnover mark sbould be able to run their business with an ECR. With hospitality based businesses this can be higher.

Multiple electronic cash registers.

If you have one ECR, then you can have several of them. They can operate independently or they can link together in some way for consolidated information.

The programming and configuration of electronic cash registers is a bit of dark art – hardly surprising as most of these things are just glorified calculators.

The average user is not going to understand how to link together multiple ECRs into a system – this is something that your dealer will have to do, and it will take time for them to do it. They’ll charge for installing the multiple tills. They will also charge to fix it when it stops working.

So far we’ve not touched on computers. Of course, an ECR is a sort of computer, but it isn’t a PC running XP or Vista. Most of us are familiar with a PC running a Windows operating system. Sooner or later we wonder if they can be used to help with the dull tasks required to program and maintain an ECR system.

Electronic cash register linked to a PC.

Almost every cash register, except the very bottom of the range, can be linked to a PC. A special piece of software needs to run on the PC which is used to setup PLUs, Clerks, run reports etc. You can then upload the information to one or more electronic cash registers.

This software never comes with the cash register. You have to ask for it from the dealer. They might charge you for it. They’ll certainly charge to show you how to connect the PC to the ECR.

However, once the PC is linked to the ECR then you have a much easier job of running your ECR. You can setup keyboard layouts and print them from your PC. As we all know, it is much eaiser to do things on a PC!

Electronic cash register linked to a PC running stock control.

The next step up is some kind of stock control. Stock control systems generally take the form of some different software running on your PC. This connects to the ECRs.

Stock control allows you to maintain stock levels. You can raise and print purchase orders, book goods in. You can perform stock adjustments and stock takes.

The administrative overhead is much higher, and a fair amount of data entry is required. However, you will be able to produce good reports of sales and profitability by stock code, supplier and department etc. You should also be able to produce any data e.g. Vat reports which your accountant asks for.

Software of this nature e.g. Geller’s Superstock, have always been a step between ECRs and full EPOS. Sometimes the software is pretty ropey, and the transaction integrity rather dubious. I’ve seen software where a stock take simply consist of changing the stock values – and never holding a file of adjustment history!

Full EPOS system

Ultimately everybody wants a full EPOS, stock and retail management system. These packages combine tilling functions, stock control, purchasing, replenishment, multi-branch and much more!

A system is usually operated via PCs, both in the back-office and on the tills.

Costs will be high – especially if you’ve got a multisite operation. The choice of hardware has a strong effect on cost, but if you’ve got a couple of branches and 3 or 4 tills in the branch, then do not expect to spend less than £10,000.

Such systems always need on-going consultancy. If you initial outlay is £10k, you should expect to spend at leat 5k a year with your software dealer on new projects on going.

A large system will also be multi-channel. Shop sales, mail-order and web all seamlessly integrated. The difficult and expensive part of this is the “seamlessly integrated” part.