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The POS Software Blog

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

Tagstockfeed software

Ten questions produce, stockfeed and farm supply retailers ask

September 14, 2026
2 Min read
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Over the last fortnight Tower Systems published an answer a day to the questions produce, stockfeed and farm supply retailers ask most often about their systems. Each answer covers what the Tower Systems software for produce / stockfeed / farm supply businesses does about it. Every one came from a real conversation in a real store.

They are collected here.

  1. Selling by the kilo, the metre and the half bag. Getting bulk sales accurate, and why it decides whether margin reporting means anything.

  2. Buying raw material and bagging an own blend. Following stock from raw material through mixing to the bag on the floor, and finally knowing what an own brand earns.

  3. Two trucks, six drops. Managing dispatch in a system rather than on a whiteboard, and pricing delivery with the cost known.

  4. Farm accounts on 30-day terms. Statements out on time, ageing visible, and seeing the drift while it is still small.

  5. Chemicals over the counter. Records that can be produced later, and prompts that guide whoever is on the counter.

  6. Labels that survive the yard. Weatherproof labelling, and why readable labels are really about trusting the stock file.

  7. Selling off the truck and at the field day. Taking real sales away from the counter, including where there is no signal.

  8. Keying supplier invoices by hand. Electronic invoice links, what is realistic, and where the hours actually come back.

  9. One stock file for shop and website. Shopify, WooCommerce and BigCommerce, with the Tower Systems software for produce / stockfeed / farm supply businesses as the single source of truth.

  10. End of month taking a weekend. Xero, MYOB and QuickBooks, and books that are current enough to make decisions with.

Any produce, stockfeed or farm supply business is welcome to use this material. Pass it to whoever else in the business would find it useful.

And if one of the ten is a live problem right now, let us know, ask us how the Tower Systems software for produce / stockfeed / farm supply businesses deals with it. The answer on fit will be honest. Being told early beats being sold something that does not suit the business. If we think we may not be right for you, we will say so.
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Contact us: sales@towersystems.com.au or 1300 662 957 or research us: www.towersystems.com.au. Locally made. Locally supported.

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Keying every supplier invoice by hand. What would it take to stop?

September 9, 2026
2 Min read
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Ask a produce / farm supply / stockfeed business owner where the week goes and invoice entry is usually on the list. It takes time. The invoices are long, and often complex.

Invoices arrive. Someone checks them against what turned up. Then someone types them in, item by item and cost by cost, so that stock levels and costs are right. In a business carrying thousands of lines across feed, animal health, hardware, fencing and seasonal ranges, that is hours every week. It is also where cost price errors enter the system, and a wrong cost is a wrong margin on every sale until somebody notices.

The Tower Systems software for produce / stockfeed / farm supply businesses has electronic invoice importing tools, and Tower Systems works directly with suppliers to establish the links. The invoice arrives as data. Costs update. Stock updates. The team checks rather than types.

That second part deserves underlining. The Tower Systems software for produce / stockfeed / farm supply businesses is not a file format handed over with best wishes. Building data links with suppliers is work Tower Systems has done for years across many specialty retail channels. Where a customer needs a link with a supplier who does not yet have one, that is a conversation Tower Systems is willing to have with the supplier.

Now the honest limits, because this is where software companies oversell.

It depends on the supplier. Some are excellent. Some send a PDF and nothing else. Some will build a link if enough of their stockists ask, which is why raising it matters.

It depends on the data. Item codes on both sides need to reconcile. That is setup work, done once.

And it will not cover every invoice that arrives. The target is the largest suppliers by line count, because that is where the hours are.

Even a partial result is significant. Two or three major suppliers linked can return most of a day a week.

The invoices the Tower systems software can import are evolving, as the AI model learns more, and we are regularly training it to be more capable.

For a business keying invoices by hand, send Tower Systems examples if invoices, and we will test them for you. If they don’t work, we will say so.

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Contact us: sales@towersystems.com.au or 1300 662 957 or research us: www.towersystems.com.au. Locally made. Locally supported.

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Farm accounts on 30-day terms. How do you stop carrying the district?

September 3, 2026
2 Min read
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Account trading is normal in this channel. It is also where independent produce and stockfeed businesses quietly get into trouble.

Terms are 30 days. Reality is longer. Seasons are hard, relationships are long, and nobody wants to be the person who chases a fourth-generation customer over an invoice. So the balance drifts, and the business funds it.

The problem is rarely goodwill. It is visibility. If statements go out late, and nobody can see at a glance who has moved from 30 days to 60, the drift stays invisible until it is large.

Our Tower Systems produce / farm supply / stockfeed software manages customer accounts properly. Charges go on the account at the counter. Statements are produced and sent on time. Ageing is visible, so the balance can be read by period rather than as one number. A customer trending the wrong way is easy to spot while the amount is still small.

Some practical points for any produce or stockfeed business reviewing this.

Statements sent on time change behaviour on their own. Many businesses find that consistency alone shortens average collection time, before anyone makes a phone call.

Credit limits are worth setting even where there is no intention of enforcing them hard. A prompt at the counter is easier than a conversation later.

Account trading data is customer data. Who buys what, how often, and in what season. That is useful for far more than collections.

The accounts side also needs to reach the bookkeeping without being keyed twice. The software integrates with Xero, MYOB and QuickBooks, so account activity flows through rather than being re-entered.

Cash flow in this channel is seasonal and always will be. The goal is not to become hard. It is to know exactly where the business stands, early enough to act.

If accounts are running longer than terms, send Tower Systems a note on how statements and follow-up are handled today. The answer on whether the software is a good fit will be honest. If it is not a fit, that will be said plainly.

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Contact us: sales@towersystems.com.au or 1300 662 957 or research us: www.towersystems.com.au. Locally made. Locally supported.

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You buy raw material and bag your own blend. Where does the stock go?

September 1, 2026
3 Min read
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You buy raw material and bag your own blend. Where does the stock go? This is the question that separates software made for produce / stockfeed / farm supply businesses from software adapted to them.

You buy in bulk. Grain, pellets, minerals, chaff, whatever your mix requires. You combine it to your own recipe. You bag it, label it, and sell it under your own name. Somewhere in that process, most systems lose track.

What usually happens is that the raw material is treated as stock and the finished bag is treated as a separate product with no relationship to it. So the raw material never comes down, or it is written off manually, and the finished product appears out of nowhere. The stock on hand for both is wrong. The cost of the finished bag is a guess. And the gross profit on your own brand — often your best margin line — is unknown.

Our locally made and supported produce / stockfeed / farm supply software handles the whole chain. You record the purchase of raw materials. You record the mixing of those materials into your own product. The finished, packaged product exists as its own sellable item, with a cost built from what actually went into it.

The effect is that your own-brand line becomes measurable. You can see what it cost to make, what it sold for, and how it compares to the branded equivalent on the same pallet. Retailers who mix their own product usually suspect it is their strongest margin. Being able to prove it changes how they range and price it.

A few notes from our years of experience serving produce / stockfeed / farm supply businesses.

Recipes change with input prices and season. The software should let you reflect that without rebuilding the product.

Wastage is real. Build it in rather than pretending it does not happen, or your costs will read better than they are.

Batch and pack size matter. If you sell the same blend in 20kg and 40kg, they need to relate back to the same raw material properly.

If you make your own product for your business and your current system cannot follow it from raw material through to the bag on the floor, that is worth a conversation. Send me how your process works today and we will tell you honestly whether we are a fit. If we are not, we will say so.

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Contact us: sales@towersystems.com.au or 1300 662 957 or research us: www.towersystems.com.au. Locally made. Locally supported.

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Selling by the kilo, the metre and the half bag

August 31, 2026
3 Min read
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Most retail software assumes a customer buys one of something. Produce and farm supply retail does not work that way.

A customer wants nine kilos out of the bulk bin. Another wants four metres of cable off the roll. A third wants half a bale, because half a bale is what fits in the ute. None of those are a scan of a barcode.

We hear how stores handle this today. Someone works it out on a calculator and types in a dollar amount. Or there is a shortcut key set up years ago with a price that has not been reviewed since. Or the item goes through as one unit and the difference is absorbed. Each of those costs money quietly.

Selling by weight, length and fraction is a core part of our produce software. The item is set up once with its unit of measure and its price per unit. At the counter your team enters the quantity, or takes it from the scale, and the software does the rest. The sale is accurate, the stock on hand drops by the right amount, and the gross profit on the line is right.

That last point is where the value sits. If bulk sales go through as dollar amounts, your reports cannot tell you what you made. Category performance, supplier performance and margin by line all rely on the quantity being real.

There are three practical things worth thinking about in your own produce /stockfeed / farm supply business.

The first is your unit of measure. Decide whether you buy and sell in the same unit, and set the software up to handle the conversion if you do not. A tonne in, kilos out, is common and easily handled.

The second is who is allowed to override a price. Bulk sales are where discounting creeps in. Being able to see who did what, and when, is worth having.

The third is your scales. Where a scale is doing the weighing, the software should be taking the weight rather than your team reading it and typing it. Fewer keystrokes, fewer errors.

None of this is exotic. It is the basic requirement of selling bulky goods, and it is the first thing we show in a demonstration for a produce business, because a system that cannot do it properly will cost you every day it is in place.

If you are selling by weight, length or fraction today, tell me how you handle it now and we will tell you honestly whether we are a better fit. If we are not, we will say so.
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Contact us: sales@towersystems.com.au or 1300 662 957 or research us: www.towersystems.com.au. Locally made. Locally supported.

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