The trend of annual sales of large retailers, including the Future Group, Shoppers Stop and Spencer’s Retail, has set in. Interestingly, these sales contribute 20-40% to the overall revenues of these companies, along with boosting the same-store sales (SSS) growth.

Future Group registered an SSS growth of 30-40% during Independence Day sales. While it recently concluded its five-day long ‘Mahabachat’ across its outlets (Big Bazaar and Food Bazaar), Shoppers Stop and Hypercity is continuing with their annual sales. For Shoppers Stop, the sale ends on September 5.

Reportedly, Future Group was targeting Rs 800-crore sales during the five-day promotional period. Kishore Biyani, founder & CEO, Future Group, said, “These activations and promotions give boost of almost 30-40% to the same-store-sales growth as well as the overall revenues of the retail business.”

Although Biyani refused to divulge the revenues earned during the five-day offer, Rakesh Biyani, CEO of the Group’s retail business, said it was the largest trading week for Future Value Retail. A spokesperson confirmed that the company did a business of Rs 100 crore across its 132 Big Bazaars and 185 Food Bazaars on the Independence Day itself. For these activities to be successful, a lot depends on the negotiating power of a retailer with its suppliers.

The fortnight sale at Hypercity, headed by BS Nagesh, started from August 14. It had offered an up to 50% discount on apparels, accessories, home ware and appliances to gadgets across all its stores. However, for Shoppers Stop, which posted a better-than-expected SSS growth of 21% in the first quarter of FY11, the sale is biannual and would extend till September 5.

Govind Shrikhande, managing director, Shoppers Stop, said, “We don’t have a particular figure as far as expectations from these sales are concerned. Typically, these sales, along with summer and winter sales, contribute to about 20% to the overall business.”

The biannual sale at Shoppers Stop is under apparel and non-apparel verticals across 80 product categories, excluding cosmetics. For Hypercity, this would be its annual sale since it is mostly into food grocery, which is not seasonal.

RPG group-led Spencer’s Retail has about four to five major yearly events such as Republic Day in January, Independence Day in August, Regional new years in April, the festival time in October and New year in December. A Spencer’s spokesperson said, “These annual events have always been sale boosters since all of them are major buying instances for the consumers. We induce more buying by giving offers/discounts in relevant products. The recently concluded Independence Day promo at Spencer’s registered a 20% increase in footfalls.”

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While Point of Sale systems are not new–large chains have been using them for more than 20 years–what is new is the price. POS inventory systems are typically sold as modules and can cost anywhere from $3000 to $6000 per station, for the software, scanners, printers, installation, training, and support, plus costs for integrating into your back-end system.

Most retailers have at least 1 station per store for check out as well as another system in the back office for store managers and inventory use. On the flip side, larger retailers average 25 to 100 + stations per store. But these days, without the right POS solution, retailers potentially forfeit thousands of dollars in profit.

The best POS systems link sales, inventory, purchasing, loyalty and bookkeeping and are able to plug-in to the business’ high speed internet connection. They can process credit card and check authorizations very quickly, as compared to the usual dial-up connection of an ordinary “black box” credit card terminal.

POS Software - All in One Retail Point of Sale Software - Credit Card Processing - Store Management Features, 90 Days Money Back, Free Updates/e-mail Support/video Tutorials

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Needless to say, before embarking on a store systems purchase in these times, a retailer will need to talk with industry colleagues, solution providers and analyst to determine what solutions fit their business, enable them to differentiate in the market and most importantly, meeting their objectives for long term growth and scalability. In addition, store systems strategy for the coming decade will require retailers to be mindful of the digitally savvy consumers.

Be cautious, therefore, about setting up with any proprietary POS software systems.  These systems are designed to run only under that merchant processor and you will be locked in to any future processing rate increases they decide to impose.  To upgrade or replace them down the road would be a costly effort. As the industry has demonstrated over the last 15 years, spending less up front will cost more down the road.

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Below are the options available in a POS system for your restaurant retail business

POS Terminal: How many should I purchase?

1. Peak customer volume – When handling peak customer volume, you need to have a plan to be able to sufficiently serve them all.
2. Number of employees taking orders – One station per 3-5 servers would be sufficient in a table service environment. High volume areas such as bars and cashier stations may need to have a dedicated station for that purpose. When switching from a standard cash register to a POS system, many people unintentionally forget that their POS system is not only used to conduct sale transactions but for order entry as well.
3. Restaurant layout – A good restaurant layout affects your employee’s service. So if you have a bar, assigning a separate station for your bar tender would be easier since he can serve customers from there quickly.
4. How and where you plan to have customers pay for their meals – Having proper locations where customers can pay for their meals is also important, you don’t want to keep them waiting do you? For paying at the front, you should have one or two dedicated cashier stations to allow speedy transactions.

What type of POS computer should I use for my business?

Desktop – The standard desktop type has the following pros

• Least expensive computer option
• Has onsite warranty for 3 years
• Takes more space but can be hidden away under a counter
• Flexible enough for adding extra ports
• Latest CPU speeds and memory
• Screen and computer are separate; if ever technical difficulties occur, it’ll be isolated.

Small form factor (SFF) – Originally phrased as shuttle form factor, a smaller type of computer.

• More stylish than the desktop
• Has 3 years standard onsite warranty
• Saves more space
• Fewer options for expandability
• Latest CPU speeds and memory
• Screen and computer are separate; so you can easily isolate which ones has technical difficulties.

All-in-one terminals – Combined touch screen and computer.

• More efficient because it requires fewer wires least space, even more stylish
• 1-2 Year Manufacturers Warranty (Not onsite)
• Comes standard with sufficient ports for almost any operation
• CPU speed is generally slower than the other two options but sufficient for the Point of Sale needs.
• Screen and Computer are one unit

How many cash drawers are ideal for my retail business?

This is probably fairly self-evident, but unless your servers carry their own cash bank you should have a cash drawer at every station you want for ending transactions.

Should I have Credit card processing on POS?

• You can easily process and track record of every credit card transactions using your POS system in one location.
• With the advance of high speed internet transactions processing time can reduced to 3-4 seconds per transaction.
• In case you do not have high speed internet, a standalone terminal can be used for processing.

How many printers must a typical restaurant have?

• Having one kitchen printer would be sufficient for your restaurant, not unless you have different sections serving different dishes inside your kitchen then it would be better if you place printers on all sections.
• For example, appetizers can be printed on one printer and have your entire main dish printed on another.
• We recommend dot-matrix printers over thermal printers for kitchens and bars because their loud printing alerts cooks and bartenders that an order is coming through and because tickets printed on thermal paper become unreadable when exposed to heat.

Is it essential to have more than 1 receipt printer?

• Since you’re going to have more than one station, you would likely need more than just one receipt printer.

Do I need a back office computer?

• A back office computer is good for allowing managers to run reports, access the system to make changes to menu, check inventory levels, or adjust employee time clock times, without disturbing servers and cashiers.
• It’s not quite necessary to have a back office computer for your restaurant, if you only have 2-3 stations. It is however a great idea to host the database on a back office computer if you have 4 or more stations so that none of the stations has the additional load of running the database.

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