Web-based POS
rings true Putting point-of-sale functionality on the Internet means faster, easier, more economical processing.
BY PAULA TRAPALIS
Shopkeep.com is a Web-based point-of-sale system
that’s versatile enough to run on iPads.
A
ccording to Ralph Waldo Emerson, “If you build a better mousetrap, the world will beat a path to your door.” While
Jason Richelson is actually building a better point-of-sale (POS) system, the concept still rings true, no pun intended. As a retailer, Richelson was, in his experience, “painfully
aware” of the pitfalls of traditional POS systems. As owner of both a wine and specialty food store, and a gourmet coff ee establishment, he knew all too well the frustrations of dealing with the cash register system. He asserts, “If you ask any retailer, they’re going to tell you that they hate their point-of- sale system, and they hate their supplier, and I did too. It’s a horrible business, very old-fashioned sort of soſt ware built on the model that you run it on a server in your store and you have to manage it, and it’s your core system of information.”
WHICH GOT HIM TO THINKING… Everything was being done on the web already. Th ey were
using web-based project management, Gmail for mail, and GoogleDocs for all their spreadsheets as well as QuickBooks Online. So why not a web-based POS system? One problem: It didn’t exist. And in a classic light bulb moment, Richelson
30 | June 2011 • www.specialty-coffee.com
decided there’s a need for this, and who better to fi ll it than someone who understands the problem from the inside. So aſt er doing some research, he hired a developer and in about two months of coming up with an idea, they built a web-based POS they called ShopKeep.com. One of the most important features, which is very signifi cant
to any retailer that does a lot of volume, is that the register is actually a piece of soſt ware. It still runs on a machine, because if the internet or server go down, you can’t “not” ring up a customer. So they created a web-based POS that’s typically designed for wine stores, food stores (as long as there are no scales involved), giſt shops, and some clothing stores, as well as food trucks. So far, the plan has worked very well. Says Richelson, “So what we’ve built is a really simple product
that’s super-easy to set up. Because that’s the other problem POS poses—it’s pretty complicated and hard to get, and you have to hire someone to help you out. With ShopKeep.com you just sign up online. You put in your credit card and try it for 30 days, and if it works for you, it works. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. And the beauty about what we’re doing is it’s more to me than about the technology. We’re changing the sales process, which
