The POS Software Blog

The POS Software Blog

News from Tower Systems about locally made POS software for specialty local retailers.

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Advice from our POS software co. on how local retail businesses can be more local

February 10, 2020
2 Min read
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Being local in retail is more important in 2020 than ever.  The challenge is how to be local authentically.

Local can mean different things to different people – it does not necessarily mean proximity. Being local could be about the level of care and attention you provide customers, the additional advice you provide, that you live locally, that you source locally or that you serve the local community personally. It can also be about locally sourced products.

Locally sourced products could be products made anywhere in Australia. For example, detailing where a product is made and the family behind it pitches local compared to a similar product imported from overseas. The narrative matters as it plays into local.

Small business retailers can use the retail POS software from Tower Systems to pitch local in a range of ways:

  1. Include notes on receipts. Add product care instructions, use instructions or other useful information automatically on receipts – making your receipt a useful information platform.
  2. Tell people where you source products. For a product made by a family or small business in Australia, include details on the receipt. Shine a light on this local product – provide extra information so your shoppers can feel more locally connected.
  3. Include a SHOP LOCAL pitch. Add an image of a poster or some other promotion of the benefits of shop local to every receipt, reinforcing the value of shopping local. Tower Systems has images you can use for free – in the downloads section of our website.
  4. Thank your customers. Include text personally thanking customers shopping with you. Put our name to the message. Include your mobile. Big businesses do not do this.
  5. Track local product sales. Be aware of suppliers of locally made products and report on the performance of these through various reporting tools.
  6. Thanks for shopping local vouchers. You can use the discount voucher facilities in the software and call them Thanks for shopping local or Local shopping reward. This reinforces a value for shopping with a local business – offering $$ discount off the next purchase based on rules you establish.

It is not enough to tell people to shop local, you need to demonstrate the value of this, you need to live it transactionally in your retail business. The best way to do this is through systems and processes in your POS software.

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Newsagency sales benchmark study results

February 7, 2020
4 Min read
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We are grateful to all the newsagents who shares their sales data for inclusion in this important benchmark study.

Growth opportunities on show in 2019 vs. 2018 full year newsagency sales benchmark study results.

SUMMARY
Newsagency businesses in the benchmark study data pool focussed on new traffic generators fared well in 2019 compared to the performance of traditional newsagency businesses. 4 of the 5 traditional categories experienced year on year declines while all of the new product categories delivered growth.

Newsagencies focussed on change through new product categories are the future of the channel. New product categories usually offer a significantly better margin, better sell-through rate and better basket efficiency compared to traditional newsagency lines.

New product categories will evolve, too. What is strong today will be challenged by another category tomorrow. Change, substantial change is the new normal in retail.

THE DATASET
This newsagency sales benchmark study represents a comparison of sales data from 161 newsagency businesses for the 2018 and 2019 calendar years. These businesses are representative: city and country, high street and mall, banner groups and independent. The only thing connecting the businesses is that they use the Tower newsagency software. Note: Each data point below is the average, mean, of all data for the data point.

OVERALL PERFORMANCE METRICS.

  • Transaction count. Down 3.5%.
  • Sales revenue. Down 5%.
  • Basket depth. Down 3%.
  • Basket dollar value. Down 3%.

CORE PRODUCTS.

  • Newspapers. Over the counter unit sales. Down 10.5%.
  • Magazines. Over the counter unit sales. Down 12.5%.
  • Greeting cards. Revenue. Down 3.5%.
  • Stationery. Revenue. Down 9%.
  • Lotteries. Revenue. Up 23%.
  • Tobacco. Revenue. Down 19%.
  • Agency. Parcels, gift cards, betting account top-up. Down 4%.

SPECIALTY PRODUCTS.

  • Gifts. Revenue. Up 11%.
  • Toys. Revenue. Up 7%. Includes puzzles.
  • Plush. Revenue. Up 6%.
  • Collectibles. Revenue. Up 5%.
  • Craft. Revenue. Up 3%.
  • Coffee. Revenue. Up 17%.
  • Books. Revenue. Up 6%.
  • Calendars. Revenue. Up 6%.

Despite there being plenty of bad news at the department and category level, this latest study reveals plenty of good news. It encourages confidence around pursuing change, embracing new product categories and leveraging these to help redefine the focus of the business.

While the newsagency shingle remains for many businesses in our channel, movement away from what that shingle has stood for is key to the future.

Print media is a problem.
With margins slim – 25% for magazines and around 12% for papers for many – the impact of the continuing decline in sales is significant. The only to make papers and magazines work is to reduce costs associated switch carrying these products – retail space and labour. Changes here can encourage further decline. This is why more newsagents are wondering when they might quit print.

Unless there is a change to margin percentage and an improvement in magazine cover prices, I suspect more in newsagents will exit print, unfortunately.

The growth categories.
Looking at the product categories for which there was growth – gifts, toys, plush, collectibles, craft, coffee – less than half the businesses in the dataset offered more than two of these. Even with the easy category of gift, more than a 25% of those reporting do not offer gifts, which shocks me.

City vs. Country.
Regional and rural businesses continue to perform better. This is across the board. It has always been thus. I think this is due in part to a lower retail space cost, stronger local shopper support and less competition.

Upside opportunities.
Toys, crafts, coffee, gifts, books and plush offer upside, as has been the case for several years. The best success comes from dealing with suppliers who do not usually supply the newsagency channel. That said, what each of these category labels mean varies significantly between businesses.

The role of online.
While there has been growth in the contribution of online, in an average business it accounts for less than 4% of non lottery revenue. There are some achieving more than 10% but they are small in number. Too many newsagents and missing out on the online opportunity.

Is a newsagency a good investment? 
My answer to this question continues to be yes. There is traffic value remaining in core products and opportunity to leverage this in other product categories.

The success of any newsagency business is more reliant on the retailer than on the channel itself. A poor retailer will run a poor newsagency. A good retailer will run a more successful newsagency.

New traffic, better margin, genuine growth in business valuations all come from focussing on products not recently traditionally aligned with our channel.

I own three newsagencies. I am glad I do. I am pleased with their performance.

Mark Fletcher.
Email: mark@towersystems.com.au  Website: www.towersystems.com.au  Blog: www.newsagencyblog.com.au
M | 0418 321 338

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Advice from our POS software co. for small business retailers on reducing the opportunity of a ransomware attack

February 6, 2020
2 Min read
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Ransomware / malware can come in many forms. Every computer connected to a network in any way is at risk.

There is no guaranteed protection but there are important steps to take. This advice provides advice designed to reduce the risk to your business.

A ransomware attack is where money is demanded to unlock your computer. Often, the computer is not unlocked even after a payment is made.

You can reduce the opportunity of being hit by an attack by taking care with emails. If you are not sure of the sender, ignore the email. Tell everyone who has access to your email. Lay out your ground rules and demand discipline.

Here is our best-practice advice to protect against Ransomware:

  1. Ensure you use professional, up to date, virus protection.
  2. Ensure you have a good firewall with strong settings.
  3. Do not click on emails or attachments unless you are sure of the sender.
    1. Be particularly wary of ZIP files in emails.
    2. The ATO will not email you.
    3. Your bank will not email you.
    4. Australia Post will not email you, not like the example I have posted.
  4. Ensure all passwords you use are strong.
  5. Consider using an email filtering facility.
  6. Do not allow remote access to your computer unless you are certain of the person accessing.
  7. Ensure you have strong passwords. A strong password should include: some CAPS, some numbers and at least one special character. Check your password at: https://howsecureismypassword.net
  8. Change your password regularly.
  9. Run an up to date operating system.
  10. Have rules on computer use: no games, no online gambling, no porn, no personal emails.
  11. Have an overarching rule: do not open any email or go to any website unless you are certain.
  12. Use a cloud backup service like the Tower backup service. This provides the fastest recovery.
  13. Have multiple backup devices for additional protection.
  14. Do not use automatic file replication programs / facilities such as Dropbox or Google Drive. If a file is encrypted with malware / ransomware it will upload to the account and infect other files.

Most ransomware attacks can be avoided by careful scrutiny of your emails and websites you visit.

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Advice from our POS software company for small business retailers facing a cashflow challenge

February 5, 2020
2 Min read
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We are asked regularly for business advice by small business retailers. It comes with the territory of being a small business focussed POS software company. It also comes with us owning and running retail businesses ourselves.

We draw on 0ur own experiences as well of those we serve in providing advice.

A question we have had recently is about how yo manage a cashflow challenge in a small retail business, a tough challenge, one that could end the business. Here is our overall advice for that situation:

The common approach we have seen from business owners is to hide from those to whom you owe money. That only serves to harm your business and put you under more pressure. It is not a smart move.

  1. Understand the problem. Know if it is short term or long term. Be certain about the role you have played. If you don’t understand the problem your fix may be inappropriate.
  2. Own the problem. It is personal. It is about leadership. Fixing this is on you.
  3. Develop a plan and document it succinctly:
    1. To borrow if appropriate.
    2. To put more of your own money into the business.
    3. To cut overheads: labour, rent.
    4. To convert more stock to cash.
    5. Work our what free cash you have availabke from your weekly trading.
    6. Ensure all creditors receive payments, no matter h0ow small. Regular payments reflect your commitment to goodwill. They also show you are not playing favourites.
  4. Talk to your creditors, apologise, outline your plan, ask for help.
  5. Act. Every decision, every action you take must work to addressing the cashflow challenge. If you have created a plan(point 3 above) act on it immediately. This is not a time to overthink things.
  6. Invest. If your cashflow challenge is because of a decline in traffic, not spending money chasing traffic will only make the problem worse.

If your cashflow challenge is more serious than a short to medium term plan could resolve it could be that your business is insolvent.

Company directors have a legal obligation to not allow their businesses to trade while insolvent.

Many have been in this situation. You can come out the other side by acting sooner, with commitment and with transparency to your creditors.

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Why businesses should be carful about using offshore web developers

February 4, 2020
3 Min read
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Web developers have no professional standard to meet to be able to call themselves that. Web developer companies have no obligation to say where the actual tech work is done.

In Australia right now there are plenty of businesses selling web development skills where the work itself is done overseas, in India, China, Vietnam and Indonesia. While we do not begrudge people in these countries seeking work, there are challenges with offshore web development beyond the loss of local jobs.

Offshore developers understand local Aussie business practices less. We have seen situations where they struggle to create commercial useful websites because oif their lack of understanding. There are terminology missteps as well as cultural challenges.

Small business retailers want people to shop locally. One way to help drive that is for these local small businesses to shop locally as much as possible.

We helped a small business retailer who engaged what they thought were a local Australian web development company. In fact, they engaged a local company for sure, which was a front for an offshore developer.

We were brought in because the website delivered was broken, not working and not to the requirements of the business. The paperwork signed, in the fine print, showed that the local business the small business owner they thought they were contracting was in fact a sales agent with no contractual responsibility.

If a web development proposal is cheap it is probably cheap because of corners being cut. Offshore developers cost significantly less than Australian developers. There is a reason for this,. This is what we say to small business retailers – beware, be careful, m understand what you are buying, understand for sure what the outcomes will be.

Here at Tower Systems we take web development seriously. We offer a 100% local service backed up by local support. We understand retail. Especially the type of retail channels in which we service. We have many websites we can share as reference sites, showing the wonderful commercial outcomes we have delivered to our customers.

Our POS software integrated websites serve a single inventory database between physical store and online store.

The Tower Systems web development team is skilled in WooCommerce, Magento and Shopify. The company has plenty of sites it can show in a live portfolio of successful e-commerce sites, serving shoppers in Australia and internationally.

But best of all, Tower Systems provides professional advice and guidance to small business retailers keen to build their online presence. Our commitment is honest transparent advice on which any small business retailer can rely.

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Scale integrated POS software helps small business retailers sell by weight

February 3, 2020
2 Min read
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Tower Systems has offered federal government approved POS software scale integration for several years. This makes it faster, easier and more accurate to sell products by weight.

Pet shops, price businesses, farm supply businesses, toy shops, garden centres and fishing shops are some of the types of businesses that use scale integrated POS software for easier and more accurate selling.

Scale integration makes sense for these businesses. It’s smart for the business, smart for the customer and smart for the suppliers of products to the business. Data accuracy is key these days and scale integration facilitates data accuracy.

We have plenty of indie retail customers using our tools to sell easily, accurately and seamlessly, through their scale integrated POS software.

The authorised and government approved integration of scales with the Tower Systems POS software enables us to deliver a beautiful solution to small business and independent retailers in many situations.

Our Tower Systems POS software talks with the scales, reducing the opportunity for data entry mistakes, making the sales process faster and delivering business outcomes that enable small business retailers to benefit.

Delivered years ago and maintained since, our POS software scale integration is a fine solution for retailers that sell products by weight: candy stores, pet stores, produce businesses, garden centres, butchers, supermarkets and more. We can connect scales to the POS and enable sales by weight. It is easy and fast.

Any retail business selling products by weight can rely on our scales integration for fast and accurate selling at the counter or anywhere in this business.

Although there are alternatives to selling by weight such as splitting and pre-packing stock and double-typing prices at the counter, these methods waste keystrokes and time while increasing the risk of avoidable data entry mistakes that can impact a business  bottom line.

We work with each of our customers to deliver a solution tailored through settings and other opportunities to serve the needs of the business. Our experience over the years from our extensive work on POS software scale integration has enabled us to provide a flexible and valued solution to our customers in this area.

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POS software

January 31, 2020
2 Min read
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POS software is Point Of Sale software. That is, software that a retailer operates at the point of sale, or point of purchase, at the counter, where the cash register used to be.

The thing is, today, in January 2020, POS software is much more than Point Of Sale software. Good software that is. Good, current, smart POS software is about much more than the point of purchase. It is about helping business owners and people who work in retail to better serve customers and through this to earn more business through which the business becomes more valuable.

That is the definition of Point Of Sale software today, in January 2020.

The Tower Systems POS software is smart POS software, portable POS software, shop local focussed POS software.

Accessible from the cloud, the Tower Systems small business POS software helps indie small business retailers compete with big business. It leverages the point of difference of each small business, serving these to the benefit of the businesses using the software.

In addition to the in-store cloud based or desktop versions of the software is Retailer Roam, a truly portent POS software solution that can run anywhere, any time – from a car or truck, a market, a garage or a pop up store.

So, as you can see, the definition of POS software is evolving, just as retail itself is evolving. The inshore and online experiences are merging. Our software serves this from web sales to in store sales to fulfilment to genuine omnichannel solutions. This is what retail needs to offer today.

In 2020, small business retailers want POS software that is flexible, adaptable and capable of helping the businesses better connect locally in ways that are relevant. This is where Tower Systems shines. Sine we only sell, rent or lease our POS software to indie small businesses our retail community is populated with retailers with the local community focus that is differentiating. This helps us help our customers, especially new customers, to serve authentically and deeply.

Good POS software does not stand still. It does evolve. Through regular software updates, Tower systems demonstrates this evolution. We are grateful to our many customers for their suggestions as they offer us a pathway for the continuous evolution of our POS software.

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Helping small business retailers cut employee theft in 2020

January 30, 2020
3 Min read
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Employee theft can be a high cost to indie small business retailers. Different studies in Australia and elsewhere coupled with our own knowledge of theft in indie small business retail indicates that employee theft costs a business around 75% of the total cost of theft.

The quantum of  employee theft is often under considered by small business retailers. We think  this is because of denial. However, given that the amount that can be taken in one hit or in micro amounts over a long period of time can be considerable once toted up.

Employee theft can be traced and as a result of this stopped. Our small business PO software helps retailers do this. We back the theft mitigation facilities in our software with training, advice and even data analysis to uncover possible instances of theft that may have hitherto gone undetected.

We also support our work on employee and customer theft in retail with support and advice to help deal with theft situations once they are uncovered. We do this because we are retailers ourselves and have personal experience dealing with this, experience through which we hope our customers can benefit.

Here is some of the small business retail theft mitigation advice from our POS software retail experienced team:

  1. Track your stock. Receive all stock into your business through your computer system so you know exactly what sock you have.
  2. Scan everything you sell.  Do not use department keys as this makes it easier for employees to steal since they know there is no trackback to stock on hand. Using department keys is an invitation to steal.
  3. Track every sale by employees. Give your employees a card with a unique barcode or have them enter a code – to track every sale they make back to them. Change the code every six months or so.
  4. Do your end of shift through your software and have a zero-tolerance policy on being over or under. Reconcile banking to your computer software end of shift. One business where this was not done was being skimmed regularly for $200 a day.
  5. Do spot cash balancing. Unexpected checks can uncover surprises. One retailer needing to do a banking during the day uncovered a $350 discrepancy that lead to discovery of systematic theft.
  6. Change your roster. Sometimes people work together to steal. One retailer found a family friend senior and their teenage daughter stealing consistently.
  7. Setup a theft policy.Put this on a noticeboard in the back room. Get staff to read it and sign up to it. See the last page of this advice.
  8. Keep the counter clean. An organised counter reduces the opportunity for theft. It makes detection easier.
  9. Have a no employee bags at the counter policy. This makes it harder for them to hide your cash.
  10. Beware employees who carry folded paper or small notepads. These can be used for them to keep track of how much cash is in the register that is theirs – i.e. not rung up in the software.
  11. Advise all job applicants that you will require their permission for a police check. From the outset this indicates that you take your business seriously. In many situations applicants who have been asked for permission to do a police check advise they have found a job elsewhere.
  12. Do not take cash out for your own use in front of employees. If they see you take cash for a coffee or lunch some will see this as an invitation.
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Claims of a retail apocalypse are grossly overstated

January 29, 2020
4 Min read
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We’ve all seen the headlines, because news outlets are drawn to  the drama of retail closures and challenges. Terms like retail apocalypse and retail armageddon have appeared in stories in recent weeks on the back of a series of challenging news about retail.

These headlines are, in view, inaccurate and unhelpful.

News outlets are quick to run stories forecasting doom and gloom. Often, the stories skate close to the surface without much analysis as to the reasons for closures. This bothers me as understanding the details can be helpful for context, and for mental health for those in retail.

Here are some of the stories already from this year (2020) with notes from usher at Tower Systems  offering context:

  • Harris Scarfe is closing 21 stores. They have been in trouble before. It is a second tier department store with  modest critical mass. It found it hard to be competitive in a marketplace;axe that does not favour depatrment stores. I think their problems are due to department stores overall being in trouble and that they are a small group and therefore less able to weather changing times.
  • EB Games is closing 19 stores as a first step in an international review of physical store retail. I expect there will be more closures. There has been a fundamental shift in how games are sold. {physical stores are not as important as they used to be.
  • Bardot is closing 58 stores. This is a fashion brand that has not maintained relevance.
  • Curious Planet is planning on closing 63 stores. Ever since they list the Australian geographic branding the future has been in doubt.
  • Jeanswest is in administration and is reportedly likely to close 146 stores. Jeanswest sells discount jeans. The biggest group of jeans consumers are looking for more engaged brands than Jeanswest offers. Their differentiation was minimal. They as a business had not kept with the times.
  • Bose is closing 119 stores. They have figured out the commercial benefits of direct online engagement. Offering a 30 day no questions asked money back guarantee and costing shipping and other challenges, the company will make more money by closing 199 stores (leases, labour etc) and investing some of that into stronger online marketing.

The Bose move is what we should expect to see more of from international brands consumers trust. They will make more from direct consumer relationships and we think that this has been considered by Bose in their decision making to close physical retail.

Rather than being drawn to the doom and gloom, which is a natural human response on reading reports like these, our time and energy is better spent on ensuring our retail businesses are relevant today.

How do we do that?

Yeah, it is the million dollar question … for which there is no one size fits all answer for every situation.

Here are some tips that we know work from our experiences helping indie small business retailers:

  1. Be the boss. It’s your business. You choose what you sell, who works there, how the business looks and how the business is marketed. Make those decisions like you are in charge.
  2. Be relevant to today’s shopper. It’s likely the shopper is not like you. Too many stores stock what the owners and staff like. That is not a model for the future.
  3. Be different. The more your shop looks like others the less it will stand out.
  4. Provide solutions. It is much harder to convince someone to buy something they do not need, do not like, do not want or do not understand. It is much easier to get them to buy what they like, want, need or understand.
  5. Embrace change. Know that what works today will be different tomorrow.
  6. Treat data as cash. Small business retailers are notoriously bad at managing data. This leads to poor business decisions, which put businesses at risk. Treat data as a valuable asset and make better decisions as a result.

Sure there is tough news out there about retail. There is plenty of good news too.

Tower Systems is a small business focussed POS software company.

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Small business retailers help local communities deal with the challenges of bushfires

January 28, 2020
2 Min read
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Small business retailers across Australia have demonstrated the value and commitment of their businesses in local and regional communities through the challenging time of the bushfires this year.

With most small businesses locally owned and staffed, they have been well placed to offer the practical support and comfort to other locals impacted by the bushfires.

We have seen small business retailers through their businesses open to local support groups, be collection points for practical assistance, be refuges and be places through with local stories can be heard in the broader Australian community and, indeed, around the world.

While big businesses that operate in regional Australia do employ locally, it is the small businesses where owners live and engage locally that carry the local stories and the local community. This is small business in action. It is why government support of small business is vital and more efficient in that a dollar into a local business is far more likely to benefit the local community than a dollar into a big business that is owned in the city or offshore.

Tower Systems only sells its POS software to small businesses, local businesses, independent businesses. This is our community and we are grateful to have seen first hand the good work done by this community through the 2019/20  bushfire season which, we add, is not over yet.

We see many glib marketing pitches about shopping local, so many that we tend to ignore them. It is the actions speaking louder than words that really matters as this is small local businesses serving their local communities, staying open, creating work and enabling local communities of have a semblance of normality. Seeing this is what matters most in fire ravaged areas – a semblance of normality as much as is possible and practical.

It is critical for Australians to shop small business first, to shop local first as much as possible in 2020 to facilitate rebuilding of communities across Australia. This has to be our goal and it can only be achieved through grass roots engagement of all Australians.

Spending local in small local businesses can be as beneficial as donating money to a recovery charity.

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We’re on a break today

January 27, 2020
1 Min read
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It’s the Australia Day public holiday today. While our after hours team is available for urgent calls, our offices are closed and our people are probably heading to family and friends for a day together.

We’re all back on deck tomorrow morning, to serve indie small business retailers using our POS software.

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Benefits of fishing shop POS software from Tower Systems

January 24, 2020
3 Min read
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The Aussie developed and supported fishing shop POS software from Tower Systems offers benefits specifically tailored for local fishing and outdoors retailers.

Constantly evolving, this POS software is a genuine solution for these locally owned and independent retail businesses that serve people who love fishing.

It is rare software too as it is POS software fir fishing shops, made for them, enhanced based on their suggestions and committees to helping them serve their local community.

  • Leverage you and your team. What you know is a differentiator for your business. Leverage this. Include local fishing information on receipts with consistency and automatically.
  • Sell accurately by measure – by whole numbers or
  • Easily sell by weight.
  • Sell by bundles / packs – Sell a rod / reel / line bundle easily. This makes it harder to price compare. It pitches you as offering value.
  • Unpack bundles – You can take bundles and packs purchased from a supplier and break them down to single products, maximising return.
  • Repairs & Job Tracking – Manage repairs, track progress in house or with third parties and notify customers by text when items are ready.
  • Stock Notes – Easily add care as well as local use instructions to any receipt, based on the product purchased.
  • Catalogue Management– run promotions through the system for automatic pricing (ie multi-buys and catalogue items) (buy any 3 lures for $10 or further discounts when purchasing bigger qty’s of bait).
  • Encourage a deeper basket. Use a loyalty program designed specifically to leverage one-time shoppers.
  • Business differentiating loyalty. Stand out from the crowd. Have customers coming back to you for this.
  • Special orders. Bring product in for a specific customer and have them notified automatically by email or text when the goods are in and ready.
  • Trade pricing profiles. You can set pricing rules based on types of customers.
  • Pre-orders – We make it easy for you to pre-sell a delivery so that when the stock arrives you can manage distribution and billing efficiently.
  • Save time by importing electronic invoices.
  • Sell more with a direct connect to buy now pay later services.
  • Cut mistakes with integrated EFTPOS.
  • Cut accounting and bookkeeping fees with integration to Xero and others.
  • Easily sell online with a direct to Shopify / Magento or WooCommerce link from your POS software.

Fishing shops are unique businesses, they are specialty businesses. It stands to reason that their needs are well served by software specific to their needs. That is where the Tower Systems fishing shop software serves well.

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POS software for fishing and outdoors retailers helps serve local fishing clubs and the local community

January 22, 2020
2 Min read
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The Tower Systems Fishing and Outdoors Business POS software has been made specifically for specialty retailers in this niche and specialist retail channel.

Our training is personal and tailored to the needs of local fishing shops too, making sure that the software does not get in the way of the business.

Beyond your everyday basic POS software, Tower Systems offers a robust and specialty POS software and support package to help local fishing and outdoors businesses serve local community needs.

  1. Connect with suppliers. From electronic invoices to reordering and more, be tight with suppliers and reduce your inventory overheads – freeing up capital.
  2. Sell by weight or length – Easily sell bait by weight or fishing line by length.  Scale integration, approved by the government, makes accurate selling easy and safe.
  3. Sell by bundles / packs– Sell a rod / reel / line bundle easily. This makes it harder to price compare. It pitches you as offering value.
  4. Unpack bundles – You can take bundles and packs purchased from a supplier and break them down to single products, maximising return.
  5. Repairs & Job Tracking – Manage repairs, track progress in house or with third parties and notify customers by text when items are ready.
  6. Stock Notes– Offerspecific product care instructions receipts.
  7. Catalogue Management– run promotions through the system for automatic pricing (ie multi-buys and catalogue items) (buy any 3 lures for $10 or further discounts when purchasing bigger qty’s of bait).
  8. Market to Customers– based on purchases, interests, clubs and more.
  9. Offer Customer Loyalty– Leverage one-time visiting customers. Achieved a deeper basket for more value.
  10. Receipt Coupons–Easily including product specific offers and more. The receipt can be far more valuable than just a receipt.
  11. Reordering– reorder based on min/max or on seasonal sales figures.
  12. Stock Images– images loaded against products can appear at POS and can easily and automatically flow through to your website.
  13. Customer Order Management–Track special orders and print a label with the customers details and sms them when it comes in
  14. Staff Tracking – Track all suspicious transactions, cancelled sales, discounted sales, deleted sales, quantity changes and more.
  15. Gift Cards & VIP Cards.
  16. Website Integration – Integrate from our POS software with Shopify, Magento and Woo. This is easy. Direct. Easy image flow.
  17. Xero Integration – Direct. Easy. Safe. Fast. Connecting your POS software with Xero cloud based accounting software for easy data flow.
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POS software helps firearms retailers safely and accurately serve the community

January 21, 2020
3 Min read
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Tower Systems offers POS software made specifically for firearms retailers. This is software made by us, in Australia, to meet local market and regulatory needs. From the sales counter to the back office, our firearms POS software is specialty in nature and function.

Available for desktop use our in the cloud, this is software made for today’s firearms retailer.

Here are some of the firearms business specific benefits people in businesses like yours tell us they love about our software:

  1. Sell accurately by weight or measure – by whole numbers orfractions.
  2. Leverage you. If your knowledge is a differentiator, leverage it.
  3. Easier record keeping with serial number tracking of items sold.
  4. Ensure compliance with structured age checking.
  5. Easily handle special customer orders.
  6. Repairs tracking and management.
  7. Comprehensive record keeping.
  8. Employee sales tracking.
  9. Business differentiating loyalty. Stand out from the crowd.
  10. Maximise the basket with easy to use one-time shopper loyalty tools.
  11. Trade and club pricing profiles. Set pricing rules to drive business.
  12. Pre-orders. Make them. Track them. Serve customers accurately and efficiently.
  13. Supplier connectivity. Loading electronic invoices from suppliers.
  14. An automated link to Shopify, Magento and Woo including images.
  15. Xero link. For seamless data transfer to the Xero cloud based accounting software.

For $199.00 a month you can use our Aussie developed and supported Firearms specific POS software in your business. Tower Systems offers a rental option as well as a purchase option. The software runs in the cloud or on a desktop. We believe in customer choice to make life easier.

Beyond the software, here are features of a relationship with Tower Systems…

  • We are local. Local matters in local communities. Tower Systems is Australian owned, developed and supported. Call us and a human answers the phone.
  • Our training is personal, in your business. We think people learn better from face to face training.
  • Unlimited free training. Long after you install the software, ask for free top-up training and all we will organise it.
  • New customer care. All new customers have a separate specialist team with which they connect, to ease settling-in.
  • Customers guide our software enhancement. We offer a transparent, democratic, process for guiding software update content.
  • Firearms business specific.This software is developed for your type of business.
  • In the cloud or in-store.You choose where the software runs.
  • Rent or buy. You choose how to acquire and fund the software.
  • We help with business performance analysis and theft checks, services where we take a deep dive into your data and provide confidential insights.
  • Every customer has the direct contact details for our leadership team for easy and safe escalation of any query.
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Produce and farm supply POS software helps local businesses support farmers

January 20, 2020
3 Min read
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In times of drought especially, local produce and farm supply businesses play a vital roll in community service, helping to keep farms viable and operating in tough conditions.

Tower Systems, through its locally made and supported POS software for farm supply and rural produce businesses, helps these businesses support farmers.

The produce and farm supply POS software from Tower Systems helps rural supply / farm supply / produce businesses with efficient service and support of local farms and community group. Through inventory management, efficient shipping, produce use notes and more, this software helps businesses serve local needs for local conditions.

Developed in Australia with local farm supply and produce businesses, this software is regularly updated with enhancements helping drive efficiency. It is fit for purpose for this specific type of regional / rural business. For example, the most recent update delivers produce business specific accounting solutions to serve the unique and demanding needs of these businesses to better and more accurately account for shipping and related business costs.

Embedded in the produce business POS software from Tower Systems are many benefits, including…

  1. Sell accurately by measure – by whole numbers orfractions.
  2. Sell by weight.
  3. Managing special orders. Bring product in for a specific customer and have them notified automatically by email or text when the goods are in and ready.
  4. Time saving invoicing and account management – manage accounts in a way tailored to yourbusiness. You can easily account for freight, produce picking slips, manage accounts, feed data to Xero and MYOB and do more.
  5. Be accurate with all-weather product labels.
  6. Business differentiating loyalty. Stand out from the crowd. Have customers coming back to youfor this.
  7. Trade pricing profiles. You can set pricing rules based on types of customers.
  8. Pre-orders – We make it easy for you to pre-sell a delivery so that when the stock arrives you can manage distribution and billing efficiently.
  9. Bagging up feed – Easily manage bagging up a bulk feed delivery into smaller, saleable lots, while keeping accurate stock on hand data.
  10. Making your own feed mix. We help you track managing bulk quantity ingredients and mixing these into saleable packs of your own brand of seed mix. What an awesome point of difference for your business!
  11. Differentiate with informative receipts. These can include care, use and safety information based on what customers buy.
  12. Differentiate with bundles. Selling items bundled together makes price comparison hard.
  13. Market to customers based on past purchases.
  14. Save time by importing electronic invoices.
  15. Sell more with a direct connect to buy now pay later services.

Software made specifically for produce businesses is rare. Tower Systems is proud to serve plenty of businesses in this niche channel and is committed to even deeper and more meaningful engagement in 2020 and beyond.

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Small business retail advice: how to deal with the emotional impact of employee theft

January 17, 2020
4 Min read
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Beyond the financial cost and regardless of the size of the theft, employee theft in a retail business can come at a huge cost to the business, those who work in it and the owners.

The impact can be felt for years after employee theft is discovered. We have seen this first hand inn businesses we have worked with and counselled through the process. To be honest, we have seen it ourselves in the early years of owning our own shops.

Often, the person caught stealing from a retail business is a trusted employees. This is where the high emotional cost kicks in. It is not uncommon for them to be a long term employee who has the trust and respect of the business owners. We have seen situations where it has been a relative of the owner or at least someone treated as a relative or a member of the family.

We have seen the impact of the theft flowing in waves:

  1. Typically, the retail business owners blame themselves for the theft or at the very least for not having discovered it sooner.
  2. What follows is the extraordinary feeling of a breach of trust and violation. This can lead to a feeling of overwhelming illness. In some cases, one or more of the business owners have withdrawn from the business – such is the personal hurt and betrayal they feel.
  3. Devastation often kicks in with the owners losing focus on the business, unable to deal with the issues of today.
  4. Depending on the extent of the theft, depression can follow which requires some form of intervention to resolve.

The personal impact on the outlook and confidence of the business owner can be devastating. Unless they are able to accept what has happened and genuinely move on, they could find themselves wallowing in anger, inaction or even depression for long after the crime has bene discovered.

The key, from our personal experience, is to accept what has happened, make a decision on how to deal with it and move on… never looking back.

Discovering an employee theft problem is an excellent first step. The alternative is that it continues unabated. Discovery stops the theft and that is a great first step. It is important to acknowledge the good news of the discovery regardless of the quantum of theft discovered.

Deciding an action plan is the ideal step two. Deciding whether to report the crime or agree on an immediate financial settlement with the employee who committed the crime is the best next step. Only the retail business owner can decide whether reporting the crime is worth it or not. Sometimes, being paid a reasonable sum by the employee is better for the business and moving on than a protracted police investigation.

Talk with the team. Listen. Console. This is a time for grieving about what happened. Either gather as a group or one on one. Ensure that everyone has an opportunity to air their feelings. Business partners especially should take time to do this and explore how they feel. Do not let this process go on too long. Ensure that everyone understands that this is the time of grieving and that when it ends, it ends so that the business and those involved can move on.

Focusing on the business is the fourth important step. Once the employee theft is caught, the action plan re police versus reimbursement resolved, the next focus has to be the business. Difficult as this is, it is important to move forward rather than to stand still and wonder what might have been or worry about the betrayal one feels. Look at business practices and modify these so that theft is harder to perpetrate, implement processes which disrupt the business and make theft easier to detect.

There are excellent government and community resources which can help. Engage and use these resources and benefit from the insights of others.

How a retail business comes out of discovering employee theft is up to the leaders of the business themselves. They set the mood for the team. It is important to reach a point of moving on and not looking back as soon as possible – for the sake of the business, its employees and its customers.

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