Investing in a full EPoS system from Epos Ready, The Fish Bank in Sherburn in Elmet, Leeds, has improved profitability and efficiency
Following an upturn in trade during Covid, Jonathan France upgraded his standard till to a fully integrated EPoS system from Epos Ready. Not only is it now easier and quicker to serve customers, but Jonathan has an overview of how items are performing and if they are hitting GP, enabling him to make informed decisions based on facts rather than assumptions.
“We went with ICRTouch and it shows all our sales and PLUs so we can now compare different products,” explains Jonathan. “If you think sales of one item have slowed down, you can confirm that by comparing it to the month before or even to the same period last year. During the cost-of-living crisis, you might have seen your standalone items come down but it might be that your meal deals have increased. Seeing your customer buying habits is really useful because you can adapt to that.”
Utilising the new insights prompted Jonathan to remove large fish from the menu. As well as revealing the takeaway was only selling a few portions, the data also revealed it was no longer hitting Jonathan’s desired GP.
“Our sales have been going up year-on-year but sales of our large fish had gone down to the point where we were selling very few,” says Jonathan. “The beauty of ICRTouch is that you can enter your cost price and selling price of each item and it will tell you your GP. The large fish was, at that time, the highest price per kg so I was able to analyse sales and GP against the operational challenges on the business. It was another item to order, rotate and monitor and I decided it didn’t have a place on the menu.”
By adopting TouchTakeaway at the same time, Jonathan streamlined online ordering, which means no matter how a customer orders – via the app, Facebook or The Fish Bank website – orders are synced and displayed on the till system.
The ordering experience is further enhanced thanks to TouchKitchen, software that sends orders directly to display screens in the kitchen, eliminating the need for paper tickets or for orders to be verbalised and reducing the chance of errors.
“The kitchen screens have improved the atmosphere in the shop because there are no shouting orders out, which reduces mistakes too,” says Jonathan.
“Also, with the click and collect orders, they are sent to the display screen 15 minutes before the customer’s collection time and it counts down to the serving time. It means we can calculate perfectly when to put a fish in so that it is ready for the customer.”
Describing Epos Ready as knowledgeable and easy to deal with, Jonathan also points to the customer support available, adding: “There is a dedicated support number and they stay on the phone, talking you through anything you need help with. Or they will jump on the till from their office if something needs a click here or a click there. But thankfully, we’ve not had one glitch. We have never been offline and we have never been unable to take a payment.”
Epos Ready 07976 739 501 steve@eposready.co.uk www.eposready.co.uk
