What to Purchase

[WaterMarkHale]

I am brand new to Square.  My wife and I are opening up an art gallery and gift store.  I am trying to figure out what hardware I need from square.  I know we need a cash register.  But we will also be doing consignment. I was thinking maybe we should buy the UPC handheld scanner.  Are they easy to set up?  Is that the best way to price items, and stay organized.  

Thanks SOOO much, everyone, for the help!

Mark

[maxpete]

@WaterMarkHale Hey Mark, welcome to the Community and great question!

Tagging a few members who might be able to weigh in with their thoughts

@HC_Charlie, @BofBArtStudio, and @JK_Fiber_Art 

[BofBArtStudio · Accepted solution]

Hi Mark, @WaterMarkHale 

Welcome to the community!

We also have a gift shop and custom art store, so I can give you some insight on what we do.

We have Square For Retail, and we use the Square stand with iPad.  We tried the Square Register at one of our locations, but found that, for our needs,  the Square Register did not do what we needed, so we stuck with the Square stand with iPad.

Attached to that we have a cash drawer, a receipt printer, and a barcode scanner.  

Additionally we have a Dymo label printer and can print labels for items straight from square.

We sell items that come with barcodes already printed on them in addition to items that are handmade or one of a kind and we print barcode labels for those.

When we ring our guests up for their items, we can then scan the items they choose, and ring them up for either card or cash or gift card payments.

It all works very well. 

We didn't have a scanner and barcode label printer at first. We simply keyed in the item. However, once we added the scanner, it really made a difference on how quickly, easily, and accurately we could get items rung up.

Also, it's not entirely necessary for you to have square for retail, however, we find that it really adds another level of important functionality for us in terms of tracking our items, and being able to report on item and category sales more effectively.

For each location, we purchase the bundle from the Square hardware store so that we get everything we need and are certain that it is all compatible. 

This bundle includes the square stand with iPad, the cash drawer, the receipt printer, and the scanner. 

Let us know if you have any other questions. We are happy to help.

[jgrgetich]

What Cheryl Said, however, I felt Register worked better for us as a Fulfillment center and retail.  The Square for Retail is a game changer in retail for COGS tracking and inventory.  Scanner is way easier, especially if you hae new employees.  Not necessary for us that know the products but quicker and more efficient when we have a line and an employee doesn't know the name and has to search for the item.  Once they learn all products its just easy, but scanning is quicker.  We have the Dymo label maker for shipping.  We got the register and the Micro star receipt thermal printer.  No issues in 5 years with anything but the bar code scanner.  One of them decided to not light up anymore.

[Candlestore]

@WaterMarkHale;

I agree with everything @BofBArtStudio has said.

I use 2 Square Stands with Square for Retail, 2 USB scanners, 1 Cash Drawer and 1 Receipt printer.  I use the Star Network receipt printer so I am able to print receipts from either Stand or even from my Cell phone when I log into my Square Pos app on my phone.  I need to be on the same network the Printer is on but as long as I am the Store, I am on the Stores Network.  The Cash Drawer I use is Printer Driven so it does not use 1 of the USB ports with the Square Hub that comes with the Square Stand.

Since you are setting up the art gallery, which I assume word be filled by local artists so no Barcode on art items.  I would recommend looking at the Square for Retail option.  Why, because with this option Square can automatically create an SKU which can create a Barcode for new items.  Just enter Name of item a description Pricing and any other details, save the item the select Create SKUs.  By doing this SKUs are created for items that have no SKU.  These are about 7 Characters long of numbers and letters.

As I said I use the Stands by my front doors and walk around the store with my Square App on, if someone asks a Price I can look up the SKU or GTIN and can see how many are in stock and what price they are.

[HC_Charlie]

Great questions @WaterMarkHale ...A barcode scanner makes everything really easy to scan at checkout, so I'd recommend using that. As far as tracking consignments, you can set up different categories in your Items > Dashboard and name each category for different artists. Then reports can show sales and inventory from the categories/artists. There is also some third-party plugin and apps (Rose used to be the name of one) that work well for managing consignment inventory.

One that I have used from the artists side is https://mvpofsales.com. Your artists can manage their own inventory, and you can use the site to mark items as sold and manage sales. Check it out and tell them "Homestyle Charlie" sent you LOL. But know this is NOT directly integrated into Square, so you'd have to separately manage on that site, and then take care of the sale/credit card processing through Square. Good luck to you!

[Candlestore]

@HC_Charlie ;

Someone asked me in a different thread about using The Artist as a Vendor instead of a Category.  When I looked at this I was not sure but then saw you can pull a Vendor Sales report which can show quantities of Items and $ values of the Items sold.  This report can also be exported and filtered by Vendor just to see one vendors sales.  I think this way may be more Helpful, so that in categories you may have Wall Hangings for Art category which could have Multiple vendors Items in this category instead of Looking under artist to see what Art they have.   After I looked into this I think having the Artis under Vendor is a better route and then the artist can have Vendors in their software for their Supplies like Paint or Canvas etc. to make their art works.  Both setting the artist by Category or by Vendor will work, so I guess it depends on how the Business or Art Gallery wants to track these sales.