Product Update: Introducing Square for Retail

[Spenser]

Hi Community! I’m excited to share some new features that we’re rolling out in the new Square for Retail solution. Square for Retail is a separate app - now available in the App Store - that adds on a suite of oft-requested features to the Point of Sale app, including advanced inventory reporting (Cost of Goods!), vendor management, and purchase orders. Let’s take a look! 

Features: 

• Inventory Plus

With Square for Retail, you have access to three new, powerful reports: Cost of Goods Sold, Projected Profit, and Inventory by Category. In order to take advantage of the new reports available with Inventory Plus, you can now add Unit Cost for each item in your library.

• Vendor Management and Purchase Orders

Now you have the ability to create and manage your vendor list and send and receive purchase orders – your online Square Dashboard is your new Back of House.

• Team Management and Customer Directory

We’re bundling some existing features into the Retail POS as well. With Square for Retail, you’ll also have access to Team Management and Customer Directory features!

Pricing:

For $60 a device per month per location you will get access to the full suite of features available above. The first device for each location is free, and each additional device (per location) costs $20. There’s also a zero-commitment 30-day free trial, if you’d like to give everything a try first.*

Processing fees for Square for Retail are 2.5% + 10c for swipe, dip, or tap payments, and 3.5% + 15 cents for manually-entered payments. Invoices and Online Store orders are 2.9% + 30c per transction. 

(Note: If you’re already using Team Management, you will not be billed separately and all of your employees will be included in the price of Square for Retail. No action required on your part!)

*Pricing for Square for Retail was updated in 2018 .

Getting Started:

If you’re new to Square for Retail, take a look at our comprehensive Getting Started Guide – it includes helpful tips for sellers who are new to the Square Point of Sale for Retail (but already have a Square account), as well as easy-to-follow onboarding steps for anyone brand new to Square.

You can also check out our Town Square blog for more information.

Feel free to comment below with any questions, thanks!

[VanKalkerFarms]

There are a few things that would be nice to clarify:

1. This is a different app than Square POS. How different is it? It looks like it's just barcode scan or search, no pages of buttons like POS.

2. It includes Employee Management, which is $5 per employee per month when added to Square POS. Does it offer any additional functionality, or is it the same?

3. It includes Customer Directory, which is free. Does it include Loyalty or Marketing as well? Is there anything different about Directory with Retail versus POS?

4. It seems like Retail is particularly intended for those with more complex inventory and purchase order management needs. Does that seem accurate to your view? It would be great to have a side-by-side comparison of features for the two products.

I think a lot of Community members will find this to be a great addition, but giving people as much information as possible is a definite asset.

[UpstateHydro]

Its about time...   Cost of goods sold etc.   Square finally listened to all of our suggestions and is selling it back to us for 60$ a month? Cant we just buy it outright..  I got rid of Quickbooks POS to come to Square but it was def lacking a few things now it seems complete but you want the 2.75% on all CC and now you want more?   Quickbooks is looking better everyday overall price wise now...      Figured this day was coming with square..   everyone always wants more    guess well all have to do the math on the fees plus monthly..   whats next ?   prob more things you can pay for monthly..  im sure       (gotta keep those stock prices up, when those folks arent even using this program) 

[teresa]

I am also shocked at the pricing. I know I pay a much higher merchant fee with square but I also justify it with the program i get to use, but when we ask for more (that most POS have) we are getting charged more so now that merchant increased fee isnt looking so justified. 

[sciabica1936]

I'm also concerned about this "per device" trend.   I have many iPads with Square Register, but they're not all used simultaneously. To use this "feature" I'd have to make people share iPads 😞

[Agate]

This per device pricing will likely drive us to another platform. We are a small retailer that occassionally needs 2 ipads to check people out on. The retail package is really mostly back-office features completely unrelated to the number of point of sale stations.

[Agate]

This per device pricing will likely drive us to another platform. We are a small retailer that occassionally needs 2 ipads to check people out on. The retail package is really mostly back-office features completely unrelated to the number of point of sale stations.

[VanKalkerFarms]

@Agate If you've been happy with Square up until now, you can continue using the Point of Sale app and keep all the features you've been using. The Retail product is an optional upgrade. If you're someone who has been waiting for some of the new Retail features, though, you'll need to evaluate the options for other companies that offer those features. If you hadn't decided to switch to someone else before, though, I'm not sure why you'd decide you need to switch now.

[sciabica1936]

@VanKalkerFarms agreed.  Luckily I'm not interested in these features as they are handled by my local inventory/manufacturing software (which costs much more than Square's option BTW).

However, I am worried about the slippy slope of per device features.  I really hope that when (and if) Square introduces a feature I REALLY need, like Advanced Discounts, it does not do so under this business model.

[setty7]

With the new square for retail app, is there a way to create/print out the barcodes within the app? We do not want to use a 3rd party applicaiton to do this. Shopify has this feature built into their UI. Thanks!

[sciabica1936]

@Spenser I haven't used Retail, but I assume there is no UPC (barcode) field?

@setty7 If so, you'll have to use the SKU field which is actually not designed for barcodes, but will allow you to scan products.  There will be no way to print the actual barcodes, but you could print a list of the numbers, then use excel, and a barcode font (like 3of9: https://www.barcodesinc.com/free-barcode-font/) to create a list of barcodes.

[Spenser]

@sciabica1936, Yep that's correct, it is still the same SKU field in the Retail app, which also works for barcodes. 

[Agate]

I've not seen any barcode printout ability.

[EJ_]

@brickelljeweler That is a great question! I'm not absolutely sure of the answer to this, so I'll double check with our Retail Team to find out. 

@Agate The ability to print out barcodes is not an available feature with Square for Retail at this time. This seems to be one of the more popular requests that we're receiving, so our Product Team is actively tracking the demand for this. If we decide to make a change, we'll be sure to announce it. 

[sciabica1936]

We always appreciate advancement, but these features do not seem geared toward retail.  Everyone has vendors, employees and COGS.

Retail features would be:

- Advanced Discounts & Pricing (Happy Hour, BOGO, Auto Discounts, Wholesale...)

- Separate fields for UPC and SKU

- Loyalty Levels (Bronze, Silver & Gold customers)

- A shipping feature that would allow us to enter a shipping address during the sale.  You could tie it into ShippingEasy, Ordoro and Shipworks for awesome order management and package tracking.  This would also make for simple and fast phone orders.

- Email campaigns based on purchasing. For instance, if you've added a new item to your store, you could set an email to go to all customers 7 days after they purchase a recently added item to ensure satisfaction.

I could go on 😉

P.S. Most of these are pipe dreams I know, but he lack of Advanced Discounts & Pricing is driving potential customers to other solutions.

[Kpay · Accepted solution]

@VanKalkerFarms - let me see if I can tackle some of your questions! 

• This is a different app than Square POS. How different is it? It looks like it's just barcode scan or search, no pages of buttons like POS.

The biggest difference between the two is that the Square for Retail app is search-centric, since it is optimized for businesses with significant item libraries. So you're right in that there are not pages of buttons like POS - instead we'd expect people to use a barcode scanner or use search to pull up items. There are also some parts of the app, like the payments screen, that will look very familiar to folks who've been using Square POS.

• It includes Employee Management, which is $5 per employee per month when added to Square POS. Does it offer any additional functionality, or is it the same?

The Employee Management functionality offered is the same as with Square POS. If you had been paying $5 per employee per month that entire cost of all your employees would be replaced by a flat $60 monthly fee.

• It includes Customer Directory, which is free. Does it include Loyalty or Marketing as well? Is there anything different about Directory with Retail versus POS?

Loyalty and Marketing are not included, and the Customer Directory included with Retail is the same as what's included with POS, with an additional (useful!) feature. With Retail, you'll also get access to the ability to keep multiple notes about a customer, including information on who added the note and when. 

• It seems like Retail is particularly intended for those with more complex inventory and purchase order management needs. Does that seem accurate to your view? It would be great to have a side-by-side comparison of features for the two products.

Yes! Retail is definitely intended for merchants with complex inventories. A side-by-side chart is a great idea, we'll see what we can do. 😊  And I agree with you: the more information the better!

Also, thank you for the feedback @sciabica1936. We know that things like Advanced Discounts (and all the other things on your list!) would go a long way to getting exactly what you need from Square, and we're continuing to make sure our product teams get this feedback. Thanks for taking the time to outline your needs. 👍

@UpstateHydro appreciate your feedback as well around pricing. We always try to be up front about fees so that you can plan for your business, which is why we outline the monthly and per swipe fees in this post. We definitely hear you though, and will make sure to relay your thoughts to the appropriate team here at Square.

[redg8r]

Is it possible to use the paid "retail" features from the dashboard without using the horrendous new retail app itself?

The stock "transfer" between locations and Cost of goods is definately a welcome addition, but why cripple the app & force users to scan or search for product? 

Assuming that larger inventories, wont need organisation such as category sorting etc. is unwise......in my industry barcodes are useless, I have products in 10 colors, all with 1 identical barcode from the manufacturer, scanning the item is useless......searching for items on the square app should never be considered a "feature" its more of a last resort.....a really time consuming last resort.

Love the new features, unfortunately we wont be taking advantage of them.

[EJ_]

@redg8r This isn't possible at this time, however it's one of the more popular request since we've launched Square for Retail. Many sellers have asked for a more a la carte style offering of the retail features, so if this changes we'll be sure to announce it. 

[redg8r]

Thanks EJ, can you doublecheck that for me? I called into support & they said we can use the "point of sale" as usual, but there will be a couple features lacking, such as returning stock into inventory after returns....which we dont need because we dont resell returned goods.

[EJ_]

@redg8r Sorry for my confusion here. You can absolutely use the Square Point of Sale app as usual if you don't need the Square for Retail app

However you wouldn't be able to use Inventory Plus or any of the features that are exclusive to Square for Retail without upgrading to the Square for Retail software bundle.

If the normal Square Point of Sale app is working for you, there's no requirement to use the Square for Retail app itself. 

[redg8r]

category filter implemented in inventory management?

This is a snippet from the OP post,.... Has category filtering been implemented in inventory management? My account does not.