How to Select a Receipt Printer for Mobile POS
Is your restaurant or retail store ahead of the technology curve?
Be honest – is it even close?
In this day and age, customers expect to see their favorite restaurants and stores using technologies similar to the ones they use on a daily basis. That’s why today’s top retailers and restaurateurs are turning to tablets and Apple iPads to run their businesses.
In 2014, this concept of mobile point of sale (POS) is very flexible. Mobile elements, such as mobile POS devices and mobile POS printers, can be mixed and matched with your existing assets to accommodate your specific business and/or budget needs. Mobile POS can include:
- A mobile device secured on a stand, integrated with a stationary printer and cash drawer
- A mobile device integrated with a magnetic stripe reader and a portable printer
Seiko Qaliber Series Printers Now Qualified for CAP Software Retail POS
Seiko’s Qaliber RP-E and RP-D series receipt printers have been qualified as supported printers for the popular CAP POS software lines. With some of the best performance specs in the industry, the Qaliber line of receipt printers are a reliable yet very affordable choice for even the most demanding POS environments.
Star Micronics Broadens WebPRNT SP700 and TSP700II Product Range
Since its initial launch in Fall 2013, WebPRNT has been one of Star’s most popular technologies. Its unique ability to enable device-agnostic receipt printing by supporting HTTP requests used in web-based applications sets it apart from other receipt printers. WebPRNT is equipped with Ethernet connectivity. Easy to read, maintain and modify; developers simply use the appropriate XML tags or integrate Star’s WebPRNT Javascript library into their web-based application to print to Star’s WebPRNT receipt printer.
To meet customer demand, Star is adding SP700 (impact printing) and TSP700II (label printing) to its growing WebPRNT family.
Star’s New TSP100 and TSP650 Series in White
No detail goes unnoticed when it comes to image and brand. Many stores go to great pains to create a specific aesthetic with their layout or design to convey the mood of the store. Whether a store is quirky, rustic or artsy; shoppers will identify the look of the store and associate it with their brand.
To help retailers make a lasting impression, Star is excited to announce the release of its new white color option on select printers. With clean lines and smooth white tone, Star’s white printers emulate the look of tablets and other mobile devices commonly used by retailers operating in a mobile point of sale environment. With a sleek streamlined look, Star’s white printers can be displayed prominently on a counter without creating disconnect from the store’s brand and visual identity.
SummerEyes Woodcrafts Serves Customers More Efficiently With Mobile POS and the Star TSP143LAN
SummerEyes Custom Woodcrafts is a small business that specializes in the creation of wood products for the home and garden. The owner of Summer Eyes, Ross MacKay, prides himself on his custom wood planter boxes, arbors, trellises and different types of nesting houses and feeders.
During the warmer months, Mr. MacKay and his staff attend many craft shows and farmers’ markets to showcase their wares. SummerEyes only accepted cash or check, but Mr. MacKay and his staff saw that it would be more convenient for customers to be able to pay with credit cards as well. He began to look for a mobile POS solution that would allow him to begin accepting credit cards, easily process payments and print a receipt.
Sound Choices Recording Services Adds Star Printer and WiFi Power Pack to Speed Checkout and Enhance Operations
Sound Choices Recording Services of Mobile offers premier location recording services for concerts, festivals, musicals, recitals, cd recordings and more. Since 1997, Sound Choices has been passionate about audio and video recording at local, regional and state levels. Along with location sound recording, the company offers a full range of services to musicians, choirs and groups looking to record their music to produce their own CDs. Sound Choices specializes in digital editing, mixing, audio mastering, cd design and artwork and cd production.
The Alabama-based recording company works primarily on location, where they sell both DVDs and CDs, depending on the venue. The mobile studio was using the e-mail feature of Square Register to generate receipts, but it was taking too long to complete each transaction and the long lines were driving customers away.
The studio’s management decided to purchase a receipt printer that would allow them to generate a printed receipt at the time of checkout as opposed to only offering e-receipts. But the company’s onsite network is completely wireless, and the mobile studio lacked the infrastructure to connect to WiFi, which would allow them to use a printer with their mobile POS solution.
Star’s New Wi-Fi Power Pack
To meet the growing demand for wireless POS solutions, Star Micronics has introduced its WiFi Power Pack. The WiFi Power Pack is designed to make any Star LAN interface printer “wireless” in a cost effective way without a lot of messy cables. This, in turn, enables the Star printer using the WiFi Power Pack to connect with tablets, smart phones and other portable electronic wireless devices.
The included wireless router conveniently shares the wireless connection around small to medium size businesses at 150Mbps. The WiFi Power Pack’s tiny size makes it ideal for installation and is powerful enough to satisfy almost any basic wireless application requirement.
Maximizing the Image Life of Direct Thermal Receipts and Wristbands
Direct thermal printing dates back to the 1960s and was originally designed for copiers and fax machines that utilize chemically coated paper. It has since been transformed into a highly successful print technology for bar coding.
Direct thermal media is essentially a self-contained printing system. It is manufactured by applying surface coatings to the media with a chemical formula that includes colorless dyes and developers. When the media goes through a thermal printer, heat (thermal energy) from the thermal printhead causes the dye and developer to activate and form a high-definition image. The thermal printhead consists of many heating elements distributed along its printing width. Each element is electronically controlled to deliver the correct amount of energy to an exact location for an exact amount of time. Those individual elements are strobed by the printer to form the final image—text, graphics, and bar codes. Fully saturating or imaging direct thermal chemistry is key to obtaining the most durable direct thermal image. Producing a less than fully saturated image will reduce the image life when exposed to various contaminants or environmental conditions.
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A799 Collection Hits High Fashion
Challenge
When a high-fashion designer and retailer, best known for its designer handbags and accessories decided to replace its receipt printing laser printers, they needed a thermal receipt printer that was capable of doing justice to their famous designer image. The challenge was finding a thermal printer capable of printing the company logo to their satisfaction.
Scenario
The switch from laser to thermal printing in any environment involves not only a financial decision but also operational considerations. A combined need to reduce printing costs, as well as the desire to reduce printer downtime and increase workspace, drove this high-end retailer to seek an alternate solution to their current laser printer setup. Thermal printers require no toner and have a footprint of up to three times smaller than that of a desktop laser printer.
Once the retailer made the decision to convert to thermal receipt printing technology, the next step was to decide which manufacturer could provide the best solution for their particular application. The overriding factor in their final decision would be the printer’s capability of accurately reproducing the designer’s logo on the receipt. Although simple in design, the thin lines of text and levels of grayscale in the logo required precision manipulation of the logo artwork and customized support to ensure the level of print quality would meet the designer’s standards
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How POS Receipts Build Sales And Loyalty
The coupon revival continues, and the source of those most often redeemed might surprise you.
According to the Annual Topline U.S. CPG Coupon Facts Report for Year-end 2010, released by NCH Marketing Services, Inc., marketers distributed 332 billion coupons for consumer packaged goods last year, marking the largest singleyear distribution of coupons ever recorded in the United States. Those coupons redeemed totalled $3.7 billion in savings for consumers. Fueled by frugal recession-weary shoppers, coupon usage has climbed from 63.6% in 2007 to 78.3% in 2010, according to NCH.
Most of those coupons distributed — a full 90% — came in the form of free-standing inserts, according to Inmar, the company that handles the bulk of coupon processing in the U.S. But retail marketers take note — that’s not where the leading growth in redeemed coupons lies.
Checkout coupon redemption rates grew 39% in 2010, faster than freestanding insert coupons, digital promotions, shelf-pad, and in-ad coupon offers. Indeed, coupons printed on receipts enjoy a redemption rate that’s three times higher than that of direct mail and newspaper circular-based receipts. Bob Carter, president of promotion services for Inmar, says the data his company is gathering tells us that consumers are still looking for deals, but appear to be less motivated to seek out and redeem out-of-store offers.
The ability to leverage receipts to communicate brand awareness, promotions, coupon offers, and other forms of customer engagement is not new. Consumers’ enthusiastic return to interest in that messaging certainly is.
The consumers who are most enthusiastic about coupon redemption might surprise you as well. Assumption might lead you to believe that the lowest income households are the heaviest coupon users, when in fact it’s your best customers who seek them out and cash them in. Coupon usage in 2010 was dominated by households with incomes greater than $70,000, with 38% of what Inmar labels “super heavy” users and 41% of “enthusiasts” coming from that demographic. Households with income of more than $100,000 drove coupon growth in 2009.
Finally, lest you think the coupon craze has come and gone, the latest figures show coupon redemption was up 4% in the second quarter of 2011 compared with the same period in 2010.
As in-store couponing goes, nothing beats the receipt. Modern, powerful software tools allow endless and easy customization of designs and parameters on receipts, such as targeted offers to customers who meet specifi c purchase thresholds. Chain-store retailers can even create store-specifi c messaging and offers, enabling location based messaging that’s custom-fi t for the demographics of their consumers.
The writing is on the wall — if you’re not promoting special offers on your register tape, you’re missing a powerful opportunity to delight customers and drive repeat traffic.
