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Restaurant POS Systems?
glamslam asks: "As the newly appointed technology director at a large restaurant chain, I've been given the task of evaluating and implementing a Point of Sale (POS) system. The main goal is to save costs on deployment across hundreds of restaurants. Another goal is to find a solution that is flexible enough to adapt to our unique operational model. Most of the vendors' products I have seen are based on Windows. I prefer the openness, flexibility, and cost-savings of Linux, yet I do not want to build the system from the ground up. Has anyone been involved in POS projects and managed to put Linux into the mix?" Are there any features that restaurants need that your traditional POS system may not include?
Use standard web technology. That way, it doesn't matter which server/client you use. You can use a PDA for the client, or a cell phone, or whatever...
Run it over some SSL on an internal only network. Put a desktop as the end machine, and lock it down to only launch the POS client.
PC hardware is cheap, web serving is a known science, and the technology is proven stable. Use standard ethernet network.
This isn't the sig you are looking for... Carry on...
Wagamama is a chain of Japanese restaurants in London and other places.
The waitresses use iPaqs fitted with wireless cards to take your order. (Very efficiently I might add).
The was a rumour circulating a few months ago, that a group of costumers saw this, and hacked their network using a laptop they had, the proceeded to order and eat a three course meal for each of them, while only paying for a soda each.
I don't know if it is true, but considering the usual record for corporate deployment of wireless technology, it sounds plausible.
Check out eCentra - their ViewPoint POS is a Java-based system that runs on Linux.
(Important note: I work for a POS software company, and my opinion is therefore certainly biased!)
I think that the very first thing you should do is create a big wish list about the functionality you want, and indicate the priority of all your wishes. You're telling that you prefer a Linux based system, but most certainly you'll have to give up functionality for this wish. Look specifically at the back-office, since most POS systems offer all the basics.
I think that the flexibility of the application will not be a problem in an installation of this size. My experience is that vendors are willing make customisations to get big clients like you. At least, the company I work for works that way.
Finally a shameless link to our software: www.icg.es/eng/.
Brain Tags |
I work for a small sized retail chain (16 stores). We use RetailPro which is just a piece of shit. Every 6-8 months I look for alternatives. Linux would of course be ideal. But for this size, there just aren't a lot of options, regardless of OS. Bigger chains have the resources to roll their own. You may want to look into that. As someone mentioned, front ends are pretty much the same, it's the back office, and transaction polling that you have to look at. I think that it would be fairly trivial to write up a couple scripts and/or rsync to maintain customer data across stores, and whatever other data you would need. I have neither the skill not the time (mostly not the time) to do it myself.