Discuss the process of getting your t-shirt line into brick and mortar stores and selling offline. Topics include industry tradeshows, events, line sheets, sales reps and other retailing tips and advice.
my wife and I own a retail embroidery and screen printing business. We are thinking about adding a POS system to make things easier. Our business is about 50% walk in and 50% businesses, schools etc. Does anyone with a retail location use a POS system, if so does it work well in our industry? And what software and system are you using? Thanks for any responses.
POS systems vary so much depending on what you want to do.
Many companies will custom contour one of their basic retail programs to work with you, but it all does depend on the end use from you.
Are you planning on having pre-set pricing on things like 12 peice 1 color shirt orders, or do you generally custom quote screenprint orders anyways?
I don't know enough about embroidery to help you on that end, but I thought digitizing can cost more or less depending on the actual artwork.
You could benefit from the software if you wanted to keep a simpler customer database as well as history of previous orders (to maintain consistant pricing) but in the screenprinting side where (in my opinion) is generally quote based on most things the retail system wouldn't get used to it's full potential because you'd be making new items constantly, or just having an item "screen charge" with a custom item "12 black w/blue shirts @ $x.xx ea"
Also, mac or pc. Macs are very limited in POS programs, but POS-IM is pretty popular (I've seen it in use, but personally don't use it)
I think you would benefit from having a POS system, but in some cases I think you may find that you spend a lot of money on a fancy calculator that prints a receipt.
Search google for POS systems, there are a lot out there.
Last edited by adawg2252; December 11th, 2007 at 09:20 PM.
Reason: digitizing info isn't worded correctly
I posted in that linked thread, and I'll post again here a FREE POS program. We have found it doesn't work with VISTA, but all other Windows - Welcome to POSitive Software Company - Home
Download a copy, it will do anything you want. I've sold it over the years to all sorts of shops, including frame shops where a lot is custom work, clothing stores where size / color / style come into play, etc.
It was originally designed for computer shops, where they could set up "packages" of components into a complete system. It can do many things, including work orders, quotes, consignments. It will also print barcode labels for the products.
Free - download a copy an play with it. I think you'll be happy.
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Yes, that one is also free. Unless things have changed with them, they are pretty "hard sell" once you get the freebie. It is a program designed for retail soft goods from the ground up. I haven't played with it enough to know if it would do some of the custom order tracking, etc.
Not bad, but they'll hound you to upgrade. In my experience.
Since they are both free in the single user version, it might be interesting to have a "shoot-out."
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Thanks, everyone for your replies. I am going to play with some of the versions you suggested and see if we like it before we impliment something that will be more trouble then its worth.
thanks
We use the multi-store version of the same product and don't have many complaints.
I've been using Retail ICE for three years now, and couldn't be happier. Clerks are able to master the front end in about 3 minutes, and I can fiddle with everything I desire on the back end. You can't beat the price, either. As to the hassles to upgrade, I've only been called once, and that was to inform me of an update to the free software. This is one of the few things I rave about to any retailer who asks.
Leopards can change their spots. Their continuos hassle was a complaint I heard from many people. The program was developed for soft goods, and seems to do fine.
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POS? 
