Industry Insights

5 Tips to Finding a Clothing Store POS System

Nov 16, 2023 • 7 min read

Is running your clothing store causing stress and headaches?

You’re not alone. Between managing inventory, tracking sales, marketing your unique styles, and providing top-notch customer service, it's easy to become overwhelmed. Would it help if you had real-time visibility into stock levels? Or if you could see what your bestselling items are? What about if you could access customer purchase history?

With a clothing store point of sale (POS) system, you can see all of these things, and so much more. However, not all POS systems are built the same. Finding the hardware and software that’s right for your store can be tricky.

In this article, we provide five tips to help you find the perfect POS system tailored to your clothing store's unique needs. We even highlight three top options to help you decide. Let’s dive in.

Finding the Best Clothing Store POS System for Your Store

With so much to manage, from inventory and customer service to staff and vendors, running a clothing store has its unique challenges. Those challenges need a retail-specific solution. Using a general POS system packed with features you won’t use isn’t the answer.

From quick barcode scanning to reporting, you need a retail POS system that handles the core tasks you struggle with. But you don’t need to feel overwhelmed — we can tell you how to find the best system for your store.

Without a specialized clothing store POS system, you’ll struggle to juggle the many tasks you need to drive sales and keep customers happy. Manually tracking inventory, sales, and other key metrics will lead to frustrated customers and disgruntled employees — not to mention poor profit margins.

The right POS system can be the digital backbone of your clothing store. No more clunky checkouts and costly errors. Instead, you’ll have real-time access to inventory levels, custom reports, and a smooth customer experience. Let’s get into how you can find one!

Tip #1: Find a System Designed for Retail

Your clothing store POS system doesn't need the same features as a restaurant or grocery store. Look for features that make your life easier.

Barcode scanning: A barcode scanner saves staff time and prevents errors at checkout. You can quickly scan tagged products for fast, accurate transactions. Tracking inventory becomes easier by scanning items as they come in and go out. It’s also great come inventory audit time!

Inventory management: Speaking of inventory management, your POS system should make it simple. You need real-time visibility into current stock levels, inventory moving in and out (and between your physical and online store), and which products you need to reorder. It’s the only way to optimize inventory and meet customer demand. Bonus: You’ll reduce carrying costs and avoid stockouts.

Customer relationship management: Your customers are the lifeblood of your clothing store. Providing a personalized service and great customer experience is critical — and your POS system plays a huge role. You need to be able to collect customer information and feedback, see their purchase history, product preferences, and other data you can use to build relationships.

Employee management: Staying on top of staff can be challenging — from scheduling shifts to managing payroll — and you want a system that makes it easy. Your POS system should allow you to create separate logins with granular permissions. Make sure you can set access levels, assign roles, track sales by staff member, and limit functions based on responsibilities.

E-commerce integration: Omnichannel selling is key to retail success. Find a POS system that integrates with your e-commerce store to sync all sales and inventory data between your online and brick-and-mortar channels.

Vendor management: Partnering with the right vendors is critical to order fulfillment. The right POS system allows you to manage purchase orders, track inventory received, and process payments to vendors. Building positive relationships will help when you want to ask for discounts on bestselling products, or when issues arise.

Tip #2: Look for Robust Reporting and Analytics

If you want to make the best decisions for your store, you need access to data. Your POS should provide powerful reporting and analytics features.

Sales reports, both real-time and historical, can help identify your top-selling items, busy times, seasonal trends, and other sales insights. You also want to track across multiple durations and categories, like daily, weekly, monthly, annually, by product type, brand, employee, and more.

Custom reports are also a handy feature. When your retail POS system generates reports tailored to your business, you won’t feel overwhelmed by data. You can narrow in on key metrics, and teach your staff to read relevant reports.

For example, you may want to analyze profit margins on specific brands, track markdowns by product type, or create a report on transaction history for a particular customer. A flexible POS makes this easy.

Inventory insights can help optimize stock levels. The last thing you want is a messy warehouse filled with stock you can’t shift. With powerful reporting, you can identify fast-moving items to ensure you always have them in stock, and look for trends like declining demand for certain products. You’ll build a picture of lead times and be able to communicate your needs to vendors.

Last, think back to customer relationships. Using the data at your fingertips, you can also manage loyalty programs better. From creating profiles to point accrual, redemptions, expirations, and more, with a built-in customer loyalty program, you can build custom reports to ensure your customers get the rewards they earn.

Tip #3: Choose a POS System That’s Easy To Use

You might invest in the most high-tech POS system in the world — but if you and your employees can’t use it, what’s the point? Ease of use is crucial. Look for:

An intuitive interface: Your POS system should have a modern, user-friendly interface and workflow. Transactions, inventory lookups, and other common tasks should be simple and fast.
Multiple payment options: Your system should allow customers to pay by credit card, debit card, mobile wallet, gift card, and more. For example, Apple Pay helps make checkouts seamless.
Automatic inventory updates: As soon as you sell an item, your system should update inventory levels. Even if it’s sold at different locations or online, you want to update the central database. This real-time accuracy makes inventory and fulfillment that much easier.
Cloud-based capabilities: You want a system you can access from anywhere with an internet connection. Need to check a sales report from your couch? No problem. Need to reorder a specific item sitting at the gas station? With a cloud-based system, you can.
Refunds and exchanges: Your POS system should make it safe and easy for staff to quickly perform refunds, exchanges, and other adjustments right at the register. Of course, make sure you set permissions to avoid dodgy transactions!

Less training time and frictionless checkouts will lead to more productive employees and happier customers.

Tip #4: Make Sure It Integrates With Your Other Systems

Instead of cobbling together clunky systems, your clothing store POS system should integrate with your other platforms.

A seamless connection with your e-commerce platform enables real-time syncing of all sales and inventory data between channels. When someone places an order online, inventory levels update across channels. Likewise, in-store purchases are reflected online. Now, your customers won’t order something you don’t have in stock.

Instead of using a separate customer relationship management (CRM) platform, find a POS system with an integrated CRM.

When customers make a purchase, their contact details, order history, and other data flow into your CRM in real time. You can send personalized emails, manage loyalty programs, and provide excellent customer service.

Last, it’s a good idea to check if your POS system integrates with security cameras and other surveillance tools, so you can match transactions with video footage when needed.

Tip #5: Consider Who You Partner With

The POS provider you choose is as important as the software itself.

Look for a provider that focuses on retail. They will understand the nuances of the retail industry. Next, check reviews. Depending on what you’re looking for in a POS system, you can find out where providers fall short or exceed expectations. Talk to other clothing store owners about their providers.

Consider your budget and what you can afford to invest in a POS system. Then, look at pricing. Find complete price breakdowns, or look for a provider that lets you build a custom system. Avoid systems with hidden upcharges.

Last, look for excellent support and customer service; leading POS providers offer 24/7 support. You also want a responsive, helpful customer service team happy to answer questions and concerns.

Top 3 Providers of Clothing Store POS Systems

Briefly compare each option based on their story, features, etc.

Comcash

Comcash, with over 25 years of experience, is a leading provider of retail POS software, serving more than 3,000 locations worldwide. We offer tailored solutions for retailers of all sizes, with comprehensive payment support and the essential hardware for smooth operations. We offer cloud-based software, a smart customer display, a webstore application, mobile inventory, and more.

Lightspeed Retail

Lightspeed Retail simplifies inventory management, enables multichannel sales, and provides extensive support for clothing stores. With Lightspeed, you can manage and stock your inventory effortlessly, import products, and reduce errors with built-in inventory counting. The software supports both in-store and online sales, with robust e-commerce tools and social media integration, along with flexible order fulfillment options.

Shopify POS

With Shopify's point of sale system, you can sell both in-store and online seamlessly. Fast checkouts, smooth payments, and centralized data synchronization help you sell more across all locations. Shopify POS accommodates your needs, whether you have a single store or multiple locations. You can also use wireless hardware for events and pop-ups.

Use These Tips To Find Your Clothing Store POS System

And there you have it! Five tips you can use to assess clothing store POS system providers.

Look for a system designed specifically for retail with essential features like inventory management, CRM, detailed reporting, and omnichannel selling capabilities. Make sure the POS you choose has an intuitive interface, integrates with your existing platforms, and is backed by a provider dedicated to the retail space.

At Comcash, we provide an all-in-one system built for the needs of modern clothing shops and boutiques. You can confidently serve your customers, easily manage inventory, and rely on 24/7 support.

See for yourself by building your perfect POS bundle. Comcash makes it easy to customize your system and pick the right hardware to suit your store's needs and budget. Alternatively, schedule a demo with our retail experts and get a feel for the software.

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