Square Online - Reporting

[YouthSports]

We are rolling out an online store to pre-order event merchandise, however are running into some issues - mainly around reporting issues.  It does not appear it is possible to run reports anywhere by item categories (whether on Square Online, or the Square Dashboard).  However, it does appear to be possible to run reports by location.

So, a potential work around we were kicking around was to create a separate location for each of the pre-orders to be able to run a report by location.  I should note, that these pre-orders are all set to be picked up on-site at the event.

The issue we are now running into is that, while it will not let you add the item to the cart if the item is not assigned to the location, it still lists all active locations (i.e. you almost have to guess what the correct location would be, or list in the product "Select this location")

Any ideas on if we are going about this the complete wrong way, or any other work around that we may not have thought through?

Also, has anyone found a way to force a customer to leave an order note AND is there a way to add to / update this order note after the order is placed?

Thank you in advance for any and all guidance!

[Donnie-M]

@YouthSports There is a difference as to how categories are used in square online and the point of sale app.  I believe I am correct in the regular online dashboard if you pull a category report it will tell you the items by category that you have sold.  I am pretty sure that the online sales, even though they can be organized as different categories, will report to their correct category in your sales report.  They also show up as "untracked team member" if you are breaking down the sales source.

What I would recommend if you really need a work around is to use an item naming convention like:  "T-Shirt - ABC".  T-shirt is the item and ABC is the category designation.

I have several locations and I had an item catalog that I shared from location to location.  The problem happened when I had a similar item or the same item with a different build or price at each location.  While this was technically not a big deal as I could set prices and such at each location, the practical application ended with sometimes prices being changed on the wrong item or modifiers not matching up.  I found it much easier to do Cheeseburger - TRV & Cheeseburger - OUC to designate an item for each location.  My reports were easy to narrow down.  Each item is only available at the correct location, but I can search through a catalog very quickly.

I would set your items up in the online dashboard and then load them into the weebly online dashboard to publish to your site.  Multiple locations may work to divide up sales, but you really would want a separate website for each location in that sense.  Sharing one site for multiple locations only works if you are really selling the same items at each location.

Hope this helps,

Donnie-M