Implement A Do-It-Yourself POS Solution

The Garden Gate is a distinctive home retail and garden center located in New Orleans. It markets its products online and through two store locations and carries an assortment of merchandise such as armoires, outdoor furniture and fountains, perennials, bath soap, and handcrafted French earrings. The first year Chad Harris owned the business, he made a significant investment in a POS system. When Harris realized the system was not capable of discounting a purchase, he contacted the vendor and was told the system could be modified if Harris paid to fly a representative to New Orleans for the necessary changes to be made on-site. Harris chose to live without the discount feature and several others he felt were missing from the system.

While shopping at Office Depot, Harris saw QuickBooks POS packaged software. "I'd been a QuickBooks user for more than 10 years, so I read the packaging and purchased it," says Harris. "I'd used QuickBooks' support in the past and hoped that with it, I could get the system to work the way I wanted." Harris loaded it onto an existing PC in his store and used it for his POS and inventory systems.