Category: POS Features

MobileGift App

Why should you look at adding Mobile Gift through SelbySoft?  In 2013 Starbucks processed 16% of its transactions through Mobile Gift!    Read more about that here.  With our Mobile Gift solution, you will make more money.  Customers LOVE cool in the coffee industry and we are helping you bring that to them.

Think about this . . . Customers can be reloading their gift cards when you are not even open!   This is a custom branded Apple and Android app that will all you to compete with Starbucks in the mobile gift market.  This app allows your customers to find YOUR STORE in the iTunes marketplace (Android coming soon)!

With this app, your customers will simply load their gift card information into the system and then have the ability to

• Pay for their order from the phone (requires scanner).
• Check their gift card balances .
• Reload their gift card system (requires Vantiv Integrated Payments for security reasons).  They even have the option to receive a discount when loading the card.

All of this right from their smartphone!

First, this is a CUSTOM BRANDED app for your store.  SelbySoft will only be shown as the developer in the app store and not the actual app.  This is why this is so different than the other apps out there.

Give me a call and we can look at setting up YOUR Mobile Gift Solution. Why let Starbucks have all the fun?

Posted in POS Features Tagged with: gift, loyalty, mobilegift, ordering

Mercury Payment Systems

Did you know that if you have Mercury Payment Systems, you have a great feature you may not even know about?

It’s MercuryStand-In.  This service allows Mercury to safeguard you against network (credit card processing) outages.  During stand-in, Mercury will approve all transactions up to the limit the merchant has.  This makes sure that normal credit card outages don’t affect you or your bottom line.

Non on Mercury for credit card services?  Check them out – It’s who we use at SelbySoft!

Bill Downey ETA CPP

Senior Sales Executive

Toll Free 800-846-4472 x4247

Direct 970-335-4247

Fax 970-335-4059

 

Posted in Order Entry, POS Features Tagged with: credit cards, Mercury

Maximize Your Cafe Point of Sale

I thought it would be fun to share a few tips to maximize your experience with SP-1 by SelbySoft.

 

1. Optimize your cafe pos menu.  If you have had SelbySoft for a while, you have probably made some menu changes on your own.  Do you sometimes think that the menu is “too complicate”?  Do you hear yourself saying, “I wish it were easier”?  If so, we probably need to look at how your menu is laid out.  While we love customers that take things into their own hands, sometimes you may add items and not be 100% certain of how to do it.  These small menu updates that are not done correctly wind up being a big mess in some cases.   Let our experts help you revise and correct your menu.  It will really enhance your ordering experience.
2. Call and check for current updates.  We are constantly improving our point of sale system.  Take advantage of these updates and see what you might be missing.  Are you using our scheduling or credit card fee updates?  What about the changes made to the barista monitors?
3. Add a free trial of MobileDash.  If you are out of the shop on a regular basis, try signing up for this.  Hourly emails to let you know exactly what is happening when you are not there.

 

Posted in POS Features Tagged with: menu, mobiledash, updates

QR Codes with SelbySoft

Last year we wrote about QR Codes and how to generate and use them in your coffee shop or cafe.  Adding a QR code to the bottom of the receipt to can be a neat way to announce your cafe grand opening.  I wrote about those here.

I recently found out there there is an updated tool to generate QR codes that gives you more flexibility.  You can find that tool by clicking here. Here is a sample receipt showing the use of a QR code.

 

 

Posted in POS Features Tagged with: qr code, receipt

Why POS is Necessary When Opening a Coffee Shop

.A great Point of Sale system is one of the most important pieces of equipment you will buy for your location.  Think about this – Almost zero national chains skip POS when opening a new location.  Starbucks, Peets, Caribou, and more all have point of sale systems in their stores.

 

Why?  I can tell you it’s not because they just enjoy spending money!  It’s because they see the proven value of a good POS system when opening a coffee shop.

Look at some of the points that POS can help with:

Labor – keeping your labor costs under control is one of the biggest ways to save money.  SP-1 for Coffee with help you stop early clock-ins.  An extra 10 minutes at $10 an hour is $1.66 a shift.  Multiple that by a couple shifts a week per employee and you could be paying $1,500 – $3,000 a year in extra wages.  Take a deeper look and see how labor costs can be adjusted by viewing your on the fly labor percent.

Zero Training – SP-1 will make taking orders in your coffee shop easy.  This is a bit harder to quantify but easy means less mistakes.  Because the point of sale has all the prices set, employees simply make less errors.  This helps you and the customer.  Remember consistency is important in your pricing. If 10% of your orders are off by $.50, that is a huge amount a year. Easy means

Gift & Loyalty – This is the number one way to help increase customer retention.  Gift and prepaid cards help bring cash in the door and increase average dollar per ticket totals. Customer reward programs are proven to be effective when handled right.  We have seen customers use the gift & loyalty program to reduce credit card charges as well as decrease the speed of service.

Look & Feel – A cash register is not cool. Customers don’t trust them and they make your shop look inefficient and not quirky.  There are all different types of equipment available for you to use.  Wall mount options as well as counter options are available.

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in Gift Cards, Order Entry, POS Features Tagged with: cafe, clock in, coffee, gift card, Pricing, scheduling, zero training

Printer Options for SelbySoft

We all see the thermal printers out there.  Thermal can be great for receipts and for speed.  They print fast and don’t need any ribbons or anything.

 

If you have a kitchen, you may want to look at an impact printer instead.  Because they have a red/black ribbon in them, the print color can be highlighted in different colors. That means the crew can see “No Onions” in red print.

Another advantage is that the impact printers use plain paper instead of thermal paper.  Plain paper is cheaper than the thermal paper you usually buy.

Finally, the impact printers don’t turn black from heat. This makes them ideal for hot kitchen environments.

 

Need a louder printer so your staff can hear when an order is up?  Kitchen buzzers can help your staff hear when the order comes through.  They work on both the impact and the thermal printers.

Posted in Hardware, POS Features Tagged with: kitchen, printer, red/black

Delivery Driver Drops

Have delivery?  Sometimes we know those drivers are carrying too much money!   You can use the delivery driver drop system to record how much money each driver has left at the store.  This allows you to print a receipt for the drive as well so there is a record of the drop after the employee leaves the money.

Posted in Delivery, POS Features Tagged with: delivery, driver, drop

Make Life Easier with Barista & Kitchen Monitors

Barista or Kitchen monitors can make life much easier in a busy coffee shop or restaurant. Because we are working with a monitor, we can really have more features than a simple printed receipt or make ticket can provide.

Let’s look at some of the benefits a monitor system can provide.

First these monitors can be FAST.  Because you can choose to have the order displayed in real time, the barista or cook can start the order as the customer is placing it. Perfect for getting a head start!

See the forest and the trees!  Monitors help staff focus on all orders as they come in.  If a barista sees three mocha’s they can get those started at the same time.

Stay on top of dine in vs to go.  You can split the screen and show your dine in orders on the top and then the to go or drive thru orders on the bottom.  This allows you to manage what orders you are focusing on.  Move those impatient drive thru and to go people through faster.

Double duty. Instead of splitting the screen by order type, split it by item.  Drinks on top and food on the bottom.

Monitor speed.  Because we display the time the order has been on the screen, it is easy to monitor the speed in which tickets are bumped from the monitor. This also allows you to make sure that you are not falling behind!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in Hardware, Order Entry, POS Features Tagged with: barista, kitchen

Rewards Methods That Make You Money

SP-1 has a very powerful gift and rewards program that is 100% free.  I thought I’d be fun to cover the three different options we have for rewards in the system.

 

1)  Buy 10 get 1 free. There are a number of variations on this but the basic premise is that a customer gets one free drink for every ten they buy.

Pros:  The great thing about this is that it is simple and easy to explain.  Your customers will feel that they are getting something free.  The theory is that customers keep coming back as they have that next reward to look forward to.

Cons?  It’s only really available in one category.  Also, it encourages customers to buy cheap drinks and then ask for a more expensive drink as their free one.  That can actually be a pro however.  We have customers that encourage the free drink to be something the customer does not normally try.

2) Points.  This is a variation on the above.  Instead of earning rewards based on the quantity of drinks purchased, it is based on the dollar amount purchased.  Usually one point equals one dollar.  For example – 35 points is a $3.50 drink.

Pros:  It stops the guys from buying $2.00 drip and then getting a $5.00 mocha.  Also, you can have up to five levels of redemption. For example, 35 points is $3.50 off.  $50 points is $3.50 drink and a muffin and so on.  Finally, you can use this on more than one category.  This is a more flexible version of the above.

Cons:  It’s difficult to explain quickly to customers.

3) Percent Back.  This is a completely different thought.  Instead of points or punches, customers earn a percentage back on each purchase.  Usually 5%-10%.  This cash back goes on the customer gift card for their next purchase.

Pros: It’s free money to the customer.  They can spend it whenever and however they like.  This also keeps the customer thinking they have cash on their card.  It’s pretty easy to explain as well.  From a psychology standpoint, the customer is never getting a free drink.  They are always purchasing it with their gift card money.  This means you are rarely devaluing your product.  Finally, you can easily change the percentage or end the reward at any time because the customer automatically has their money.  With the other two methods it can be hard to end the program because the customers perceive that they are losing points or punches.

Cons:  They are never really seeing the “free” aspect of the reward.

 

There you go!  Give us a call and see it in action.

 

Posted in Gift Cards, POS Features Tagged with: buy 10 get 1 free, cash back, gift card, points, punches, rewards

Simplify the Barista & Kitchen Job with Remote Printing

Having a barista or cook away from the POS ordering station can be hard.  If the sandwich or espresso line is close to the register, you can still have problems tracking multiple orders.

The traditional way of solving this?

• Yelling the order out.  It’s chaotic and causes a lot of mistakes.
• Handwriting orders.  Employees can’t read what was written in a rush.

Having a barista or kitchen receipt is a far better way to do this!  The order prints right where the barista or cook is and allows them to see exactly what they need to make.    In the example below, this shows the items, recipes, weights for portions and more.

 

 

If your barista or cook is right next to the POS, you can still take advantage of this by printing out the make receipt out of the receipt printer you already have.

 

A couple of optional features can enhance this as well.  Add a buzzer to the printer and make sure your kitchen staff can hear when an order prints.

Add a sticky option for paper and have make tickets that double as customer receipts by sticking right to the cup or bag!

 

 

Want more information?  As always, give us a call and we can help make you more efficient!

Posted in Order Entry, POS Features, Technology Tagged with: barista, kitchen, printers