By Jared Isaacman, Harbortouch
With February 14th only days away, retailers are watching gifts ranging from boxed chocolates to stuffed animals flying off store shelves as if Cupid himself were whisking them away. Running out of candy, or any other Valentine’s Day classic, is a loveless situation for retail stores trying to capitalize on the sales spike surrounding the holiday.
Luckily, retailers and last-minute holiday shoppers alike don’t have to stress about in-store stock. Many of today’s touch-screen point of sale (POS) systems offer unique inventory management features that ensure shelves remain fully-supplied with the brands their customers purchase most — taking into account last year’s top gifts, as well as what’s new this Valentine’s Day, to ensure customer demand is met.
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POS systems equipped with inventory management capabilities provide a simple and accurate way to ensure an up-to-date product inventory. When all sales are tracked in the same system, it becomes very easy to keep count of stock on hand. Businesses can upload their inventory records to the system and set automatic re-order alerts to avoid running out of products and losing a sale.
For managing multiple stores, these systems offer multi-location stock control, so cashiers can check product levels at other stores from the POS, and managers can order items from different locations, without worrying about manually adjusting inventory.
In addition, sales report features put critical inventory information at business owners’ fingertips, enabling them to filter reports by sales figures, product, brand, profit and time period, to name a few.
The reports help answer a wide range of questions, including:
- Which products are the most popular? Which ones might you consider phasing out?
- What are customers’ favorite products and brands?
- Did you run sales and promotions that were especially successful?
- Or did particular products contribute to a promotion’s success?
Harbortouch customer Moon Dance Wine & Spirits utilizes these tracking and reporting features in its POS. With such an extensive inventory, Moon Dance depends on POS accuracy and ease-of-use, especially during peak sales periods like Valentine’s Day, when customers are looking for the perfect bottle of wine to accompany their special dinner. The ability to access this kind of sales data helps Moon Dance and other retail stores determine how many wine shipments from Beringer or chocolate shipments from Russell Stover it would need to meet the demand of the upcoming holiday.
But inventory management goes beyond ensuring shelves are full with the right product; it also helps personalize the overall customer experience. To enhance customer service and engagement, POS systems can retain customer data and purchase history. After all, who knows the customer better than the customer himself? This information can then be applied to loyalty programs and marketing campaigns to better target consumers, help boost brand loyalty and encourage repeat business. The more you understand customers’ buying habits, the better you can plan to have what they want to buy, when they want to buy it.
Whether it’s during a busy holiday, such as Valentine’s Day, or just another typical week of sales, inventory management has a dramatic impact on retailers’ bottom lines. From ensuring the right stock is on hand at all times and seamlessly ordering and managing products, to providing a top-notch customer experience and enhancing marketing campaigns, the inventory management features in today’s POS systems are enabling retailers to show consumers the love when it comes to meeting their shopping demands.
Jared Isaacman is the Founder and CEO of Harbortouch, a leading national POS system provider based out of Allentown, Penn. The company offers an unparalleled “free” program that supplies a full-featured POS system to restaurants and retail businesses with no up-front costs. Under Isaacman’s hands-on leadership, Harbortouch has become one of the largest POS providers in the country, serving over 120,000 businesses nationwide. Isaacman has been recognized as one of “America’s Best Entrepreneurs” by BusinessWeek Magazine and “30 Entrepreneurs Under 30” by Inc. Magazine. For more information, visit www.harbortouch.com.
