What makes pizza shops unique are their menus. They are simple in the fact that they feature fewer items than other restaurant types, but also complex in the fact that customers can choose from a selection of sizes, toppings, sauces, cheeses and crusts. That’s what makes them so popular – customers love that they can tailor their order to fit their exact mood or taste.
However, with uniqueness comes challenge. Pizza shop POS systems must be able to support the following ordering and reporting functions:
- Prices
When it comes to pizza, pricing can be confusing. It’s not as simple as adding the amount of toppings to the price. Many will choose to “create their own” and customize their toppings. But when orders are not standardized, prices cannot be flat.
Here are a few pricing challenges that pizza shops may encounter:
- Some toppings may cost more than others (e.g. meat, stuffed crust, extra cheese)
- Some toppings may be seasonal (e.g. pineapple or anchovies)
- Some options may only be applied to a fraction of the pizza (e.g. half pepperoni)
- Pricing may be adjusted for the amount of toppings (e.g. $1 for the first three toppings and $0.50 for each additional)
It’s important that your POS system has the modifiers and pricing options to support these orders. If they are entered incorrectly, a couple of things could happen: customers could be charged too much or too little or inventory could be calculated incorrectly. These issues can lead to much larger problems, such as customer complaints, inventory discrepancies and ingredient shortages.
- Promotions
Pizza coupons, deals and promotions tend to be more specific than “get 20 percent off your next purchase.” They usually offer free items in the event that a customer purchases a different specified item.
For example, “get three free toppings on your next large pizza” or “enjoy a free small pizza with your purchase of two large pizzas with two toppings each.” And these offers might exclude modifications such as stuffed crust or extra cheese. These conditions should be included in the POS system to ensure coupons are being used correctly.
Promotions like these that include specifics and conditions can be tricky to enter into the POS system. It’s important that pizza shops are able to set up these unique promotions so that they can be easily entered and applied by employees. If a customer calls and experiences complications while trying to use their coupon, they are likely to be dissatisfied with their experience.
Not to mention, customers may present their coupons online, over the phone or in person, depending on the offer and the shop’s capabilities. Coupons should be able to be redeemed with both buttons and codes so customers can read off or type in the code if necessary.
As mentioned, it is also important that employees are able to enter these promotions accurately for cost reasons. It’s bad business to under or overcharge customers.
- Inventory
It’s crucial to keep a close eye on inventory counts in any restaurant, and especially in a pizza shop – they should never have to turn a customer away because they’ve run out of pepperoni. The cost of food is also a constant concern. Pizza POS systems must be able to generate detailed inventory reports based on the exact ingredient amounts that are used in each order and in each day.
This can be challenging for pizza shops because the way the order is entered might not actually reflect the amount of ingredients that are being used. For example an all-pepperoni pizza may use more pepperoni slices than one that includes pepperoni as one of four toppings.
And if a customer requests a substitution or extra ingredients, employees should be able to enter that as a modifier and the POS system should be able to take that into account when generating inventory reports.
- Delivery
Most pizza shops include both delivery and take-out options. And those who don’t are probably planning to implement a delivery service in the future because of the obvious business benefits it can provide. Either way, pizza POS systems must be able to support delivery operations.
The system should include delivery zones, delivery fees, repeat orders and mapping to ensure that each order is accurately priced and delivered, allowing for smooth operations and satisfied customers.
Every part of a pizza POS system – down to the hardware – should work to overcome these challenges and make order entry, inventory management and customer satisfaction quick and easy processes.
