We were lucky enough to get our hands on a couple of the New Square Registers and we've been using them for a couple of weeks now, so here's my completely unbiased review of the sweet new hardware.
+ Appearance:
Holy cannoli this thing is beautiful. The dark gray metal, the huge screens, the beautiful angles, it's an absolute marvel that definitely classes up our shop. While looks aren't everything, they absolutely help. We're big fans.
+ Dedicated System:
We really love that all this thing is and does is a register. No more dealing with locking down the iPad or worrying about my employees doing other things on it. It automatically reboots everynight in case there's a new update, and if it does it updates automatically.
+ Customer Facing Display:
This is the real reason we got this thing, the customer facing display is worth its weight in gold. No more customers asking us to go back and tell them how much each thing costs, and ask again for the total, it's all right there in front of them, updating as we ring things up. The customer is responsible for putting in their own card, which frees up my employees to bag things up, and lowers risk of my employees forgetting to give them the card back. And if the customer puts in the card the wrong way, it tells them that and shows them how to put it in the right way. Genius!
We also love that it can either be docked on the back of the register or connected with a wire. While when it's docked it makes it a little harder if you need to override anything, or swipe to load up a gift card, it's not too bad.
The display is also a touch screen of course, so the customer can sign if needed, choose their own receipt method, type in their own phone number or email, and all that! We'd love to be able to customize the receipt screen in the future which is not available yet (we don't want them to be able to print a receipt) but that's hopefully coming. We use the Loyalty system, so the customer can claim their own stars and type in their own phone number which is a huge time saver and puts the onus on the customer to interact, rather than just us. While this screen and system can use a bit of work and polish to make it easier and less cumbersome, we love the potential and cant wait to see what this thing can do in the future.
+ Bigger Screen:
We've been begging for a bigger screen ever since we got our first Square running iPad. There's room for more text under each item, and the text is all bigger which makes readability incredibly easy. It's also nice having the permanent side bar with pages and categories all there all the time. It takes a bit of getting used to the pages being on the side instead of the bottom, but it's easy enough.
- It's still new:
Most of my complaints and issues with this lie in the fact that it's a really really new device that's not even fully in stock yet. There's so much new tech and new possibilities with this thing that it takes time to polish things and develop software and processes that fully take advantage of what it can do. But from what I've seen with Square over the past 5 years of using it, this thing is going to be even better than it is pretty soon. It all can be fixed with software updates.
- The Fees:
While I don't like the new fee structure, since my average transaction sizes make it so I pay more for fees with this than with a standard iPad, to us all of the benefits are worth it. We're hoping to hit the mark soon, so we can apply for lower rates, and having a customer facing display that makes it really apparent that we accept credit cards should help us get there!
Hope this helps! Overall we're in love and we're glad we got them!
Let me know if you have any questions!
Pesso
UPDATED: 2-9-18
Another 2 months of use, and we love them just as much as before. Still some kinks left to work through, but they've already improved a bunch of bugs that were bugging us.
We love the Register so much, we got ourselves a third one!
After some sweet slight renovations this winter here's our updated setup!
We got a wider, shallower, and taller Register Counter to fit 2 side by side with the cash drawer inside with no pesky wires showing, and got rid of the glass for a more open, airy, modern, inviting, and interactive vibe. We love it!
We're also now promoting our Stickers and Gift Cards with the little Table Marker stands which puts them right into view of customers and has already helped us sell more!
inventory and tracking of POs and such are some of the main Square for retail features. So if you don't find that useful it probably isn't worth paying extra for it. The interface is completely different in Square for Retail too with it being barcode based and doing away with the visual front end of Square POS and picking your items from a grid.
