How can a restaurant point of sale system help your eatery succeed? Here are four ways:
1. Streamline Operations:
A restaurant point of sale system does more than take orders and print checks. A full service package routes orders to the kitchen, monitors inventory, accepts coupons and facilitates loyalty programs. Time is money, and the more efficiently your restaurant operates, the bigger the payoff. A solid POS solution can help optimize every area of a restaurant, including back-office operations, like scheduling/shift reports, inventory management, reporting, gift cards, loyalty programs and more. Automating these processes means fewer errors, less waste, and more time serving customers and focusing on business growth.2. Growth Opportunities:
POS systems offer the opportunity to add new revenue streams through gift card sales, loyalty programs and online ordering. Gift card and loyalty programs help turn first time and frequent customers into loyal ones. Customers are more likely to choose your restaurant over the competition if they know they can earn points, coupons or free drinks, sides and desserts every time they visit. Online ordering is another great way to boost revenue and attract new customers. Implementing an online ordering system means a better customer service experience for diners and encourages larger checks by giving people extra time to look through the menu and discover new items they would like to try. These higher-value orders can also help generate marketing opportunities based on a customer’s order history.3. Decrease Expenses:
A restaurant POS system gives insight into two of an eatery’s biggest expenditures: ingredients and labor. Depending on the restaurant POS system, you can use the ingredient tracking function to help monitor inventory levels, forecast accurate usage and reorder accordingly. Generating ingredient tracking reports will give insight into customers’ dining preferences, which you can use as a guideline for menu planning.Managers can use the POS system’s reporting functionality to identify peak shifts and make informed decisions on how many employees to schedule at any time. This ensures you never have too many people getting paid to just stand around, or worse, not enough people scheduled to work, which means longer waits and unhappy customers.
4. Greater Visibility:
You don’t know what you can’t see. If you aren’t taking advantage of automatic reporting on a daily or weekly basis, you are missing out on valuable intel on what does and doesn’t work to increase sales. Choose a restaurant point of sale system that presents information in easy-to-read reports in a variety of flexible formats. These reports can reveal important statistics and identify trends in sales forecasting, ordering processes, and marketing promotions. A cloud-based restaurant point of sale system means you can keep tabs on your restaurant from anywhere in the world with an internet connection.Using the right restaurant point of sale system isn’t an option if you want to operate a profitable competitive business — it’s a necessity. In the highly competitive restaurant industry, make sure you are equipped with the tools that will help build your bottom line and ensure long-term success.
