Restaurants ID POS Must-Haves

With technology deployment plans focusing on the omni-experience, point of sale capabilities need to be increasingly robust. During a recent meeting of the Restaurant Accounting Innovation Council, co-founded by Hospitality Technology and Restaurant365 Software, finance executives discussed the role of the POS as it relates to other software and functionalities. The executives agreed that integrating systems to have a cohesive view of data was vital, but what functions should reside in the POS and what can remain separate?

According to Hospitality Technology’s 2017 Restaurant Technology Study, restaurants are ready to embrace omni-experience strategies, but investments are still needed. In particular, 62% of operators named omni-channel management as a good-to-have or must-have, but only 15% of restaurants have it in place.

HT asked operators to call out functions that they believe are must-haves for the POS versus what already exists, is a “nice to have,” or is not necessary. Responses reveal that restaurants are prioritizing omni-experience with mobile payment, managing orders from other channels, and CRM topping the list of must-haves.

Analytics and forecasting is a must-have for one out of four operators. With all of the other capabilities running through the POS including CRM/loyalty programs, mobile payment and social media integration, the ability to harness and take action from data is vital. This makes the 23% of operators that believe that social media integration is not needed and the 18% that think CRM/loyalty management is not a necessary function of the POS, concerning.

The chart below breaks down that while it’s good for all of these items to reside in the POS, they don’t need to and quite honestly it would become unmanageable for the POS to house them all. Beyond the commerce capabilities inherent in the POS, CRM and loyalty do belong inside, but everything else can remain separate. As restaurants struggle to identify ROI for tech investments, this can be a scale that operators – in an attempt to keep costs down – reference to decide what should be in the POS at the bare minimum and what should be out.