POS: Always a Hot Topic

Whenever I'm out mixing with industry executives the question always comes up, "What are the hot topics with HT readers these days?" Hot topics ebb and flow depending on what's happening in the world of technology and customer service. Social networking and PCI have certainly been important lately; but there's always one area that, no matter what, ranks at the top of the list: point of sale. On average, more than half of the most read headlines on htmagazine.com in any given month have "POS" as a major focus.

Knowing that POS is so important to you, we work hard to cover the topic as much as possible through web seminars, vendor and readership surveys, and through identifying trends as they happen. A review of some of our most-recent POS-related studies offers these insights:

• Tableside POS for ordering and/or payment is growing in popularity among restaurant operators. It was ranked the "most interesting" platform innovation for 2010 by nearly half (46.4%) of restaurants responding to our recent reader survey.
• Open source technology (at 22.9%) trails just behind software-as-a-service (24.8%) for "most interesting" POS platforms in 2010.
• The most important POS features in 2010 will be accounting and financials (63%), followed by labor management (62%).
• Business intelligence ranks as the most under-valued POS function in 2010, with only on-third of restaurants ranking it as "most important."

These and other POS trends can be found in the 2010 Restaurant Technology Study, just published this month, and online in the POS Software Trends report, published in February 2010. Both can be downloaded from our website at www.htmagazine.com.