Finding the Software That Makes Business Easier For You
Computers have made our lives easier, and they have revolutionized business in the process. Even consignment stores have found the efficiency computers bring to be incredibly important.
While some consignment store owners may wrestle with the decision to computerize their shop, there are many who feel it is impossible not to. Some of the items that can make it easier to run a consignment store include a computer, printer, software, bar code reader, receipt printer and a computerized cash register.
Why Implement A Computer System?
With a system in place that computerizes your store, you will save several days work at the end of the month trying to organize your receipts and finances. With a computerized system, you can actually post the point of sale right into the consignorís account when the item is purchased. This makes it easier for you to manage your cosigners and what they are owed.
When you have a good system in place, you can get daily, monthly and yearly reports on sales, items donated and anything that has not been paid to a consignor. You can see what sells better in the store and what you donít sell much of. In short, it makes your entire store more efficient and easier to run.
Price Tags
Price tag software can help you make price tags that are clear and well-designed to catch your customerís eye. With price tag software, you can program several different formats; including having a single price that is marked down to a different price. An example of this is
Pants $14.99
After 2/27/10 $12.99
After 3/27/10 $ 8.99
With markdown tags that are entered in software and printed off the computer, you can avoid handwritten reductions which saves you time.
Making Managing Consignors Easier
Managing your consignment contracts can be difficult at times, especially if you have a large amount of consignors. For every consignor, you need to assign merchandise to them and you have to monitor when the merchandise is sold so that you can pay the consignor their share. Without a computer system, this can be incredibly time consuming. If not for anything else, having a computer system and consignment software in place will make your life much easier with consignors and their contracts.
You can enter all your consignors into the software with all their merchandise to them. At this point, with your point of sale computer, you can set up an alert so that when the consignor’s merchandise is sold, you know about it. With that information, you can now make sure the consignor gets their share quickly and easily. The easier and quicker they get their money, the more often they will work with you when they have more merchandise they want to sell at your consignment store.
It would take days to sort through receipts and inventory to see what has been sold so that you can get the consignors what they are owed, if you didn’t have the computer software system in place. With this system, you save hours and in the world of business, time is money. This is why more and more consignment shops are paying the extra cost to get systems put in place that make their lives easier and their shops more efficient.
The world is computerized, and consignment shops need to be as well.
{ 1 comment }
Good advice Pam. Please allow me to add a few important considerations when shopping for consignment software:
1. Nothing substantial is gained by paying $1,000+ for software.
2. Annual service fees are very unnecessary.
3. Most programs are written, sold and maintained by individual programmers.
4. Pay for software ownership, not just a license only allowing the use of the software.
5. Ask for a written disclosure of all fees and policies prior to purchase. If your request is refused, refuse to buy the software.
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