One thing most business owners have in common is the desire to grow. If you run a café, there are several ways for you to improve your business. One of which is choosing the right POS app for your café. There are many POS systems out there. But not all of them have specific features for a café.
However, the best POS app for your café will be one that has café specific features with suitable hardware and is affordable. This article will discuss the best POS app for a café and the factors to consider while choosing a café POS system.
Factors to consider when choosing a Café POS app
Your café needs a POS app with unique features, and not every POS comes with these features. There are several factors you need to keep in mind while choosing a POS app for your café. These factors include the following:
Feature set
The first thing to check while selecting a POS app for your business is the feature set. You need a POS app that is suitable for a café. If it does not have the necessary features that your café needs, your sales process won’t function efficiently.
It is essential to consider your business needs before choosing a POS app. Think about all the features you do not need now but will need in the future.
Hardware
You will also have to check the kind of hardware that will be suitable for your café. Check the number of POS terminals you will need in your café. You will make sure that your POS hardware matches your café setup.
Pricing
You may want the cheapest POS app, but you cannot consider price alone. You may end up purchasing a POS system that is unsuitable for your café. It would be best if you considered the following:
- Card processing fees
- Monthly or annual contracts
- Cost of the POS hardware
- Software costs
Four best POS apps for a Café
Here are the best four POS apps for a café with their feature set, hardware options, and pricing breakdowns.
Toast
Toast POS is an excellent POS app for the foodservice industry. It is the overall best POS app for cafés. Even though it is more expensive than some other POS apps, Toast has powerful features. These features make it well suited for medium and large businesses. You can accept credit card payments with Toast.
Toast Standout Features: It has many features that make it best suited for a café. These features include:
- Pre-authorized payments
- Menu management
- Advanced POS reports
- Split bill functionality
- Employee management
- Easy to learn
- Flexible setup
- Quick Service tools
Toast Pricing: Toast charges $79 per month to purchase a POS terminal. For extra terminals, you will pay $50 each. Toast will give a custom quote if you want more than six terminals for your cafe.
Square
Square is an excellent iPad POS app with café suited features. Square for Restaurants is easy to use and a very affordable system. This quality makes it great for tech novices and small cafés.
Square Standout features: Square for Restaurants offers the below-given specific features for your café:
- Excellent user experience
- Marketing tools
- Menu management
- Easy to use
- Conversational ordering
- Intuitive system
Square Pricing: The Square for Restaurant POS software is free and has no monthly fees. But you will have to pay processing fees at a flat rate of 2.6% and an extra $0.10 per transaction. Square’s POS hardware registration will cost you $60 per month for the first time. Additional registration is $40 per month.
Square for Restaurant is an affordable POS app. If you want a simple POS system at a great price, you should go for Square.
ShopKeep
The Shopkeep POS app is suitable for quick service businesses and is great for a café. Their POS system runs on Clover hardware.
ShopKeep Standout Features: ShopKeep is a simple POS app, but it has features suitable for small and medium-size café. These features are:
- Pocket mobile app
- Inventory management
- Employee permission management
- Menu management
- Tab management
- Split bill functionality
ShopKeep Pricing: ShopKeep charges a monthly subscription with no contract and is good for new businesses. They don’t have a fixed-rate pricing option. You will have to pay $69 per month for one POS terminal, and you can have up to three.
More terminals cost $29 per month. A small business that handles less than $5,000 per month needs only one register. ShopKeep has a free plan that includes unlimited inventory and sales reporting for small businesses.
Upserve
Upserve is another excellent café POS app that is rich in features like CRM and reputation management tools. It is designed by restaurant workers, and so it is very intuitive. It is a pricey POS app, but the feature set makes up for it.
Upserve Standout Features: Upserve POS app includes all the features you would want for your coffee shop or café. These features are:
- Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool
- Reputation tool
- Team Management
- Online ordering
- Restaurant Analytics
- Easy to use
Upserve Pricing: You will have to pay a monthly subscription fee between $59 and $359, and an additional $40 to $60 per terminal. Hardware pricing is based on a quote, but you have to budget more than $200. You can run Upserve on iPads and Android tablets.
Installation includes menu setup, hardware and PCI configuration, customization, and data migration and costs $1,700. Processing fees are at 2.49% plus 15 cents for card-present transactions.
Conclusion
There are many Point of Sale (POS) apps out there. But the best one for a café should have the right features, have good pricing, and suitable hardware. The overall best café POS app on the market is Toast. It is ideal for both small and medium businesses. In all, your café deserves the best when it comes to choosing a POS app.
