Owning a liquor store can be a very lucrative business endeavor. With the right location and merchandising, there is never a shortage of customers who are eager to find their favorite libations. Adults in the US drink almost four alcoholic beverages per week on average, and the types of drinks that people enjoy continue to change and evolve.
The liquor industry typically enjoys a steady demand. However, it comes with a ton of competition, as well as relatively low profit margins compared to other retail industries. Accordingly, one of the most important liquor store industry trends is using point of sale software that delivers actionable insights and reporting to make the most of your sales data. Here is a detailed guide to POS analytics for liquor stores.
Table of Contents
- Liquor Store Industry Trends: POS Inventory Analytics
- Sales Insights To Forecast Demand
- Key Performance Indicators For Liquor Stores
- Smart Data Based Promotions
- Staff Productivity Assessments
Liquor Store Inventory Optimization With POS Analysis
As you can imagine, there are a whole lot of alcoholic products out there. Liquor stores have an extremely large number of SKUs in stock. Thus, inventory management is one of the most important aspects to running a successful liquor store.
Optimized inventory management is not just about keeping all of the products in stock. It also means ensuring that you don’t over commit to shelving too many slow moving items for too long. In other words, successful inventorying is about balance.
KORONA POS offers perpetual inventory so that you always have an accurate count for all of your items. Our system comes with an automated widget to optimize order levels. By analyzing your sales data over time for each item, our software will do the math for you, telling you exactly how much of a product you should order from your supplier.
Plus, you’ll get automatic reordering and custom low stock notifications. Not only will you not have to worry about running out of the stock that you need, but you’ll also save time and labor costs by letting your POS software do the busy work.
Built-In ABC Analysis
KORONA POS comes pre-loaded with ABC analysis. This inventory control technique separates items into three categories: A, B, and C. The A category makes up a smaller percentage of your stock but a larger percentage of your net sales. The B category is somewhere in the middle. The C category is the opposite of A, making up a larger percentage of your stock but a smaller percentage of your net sales.
ABC analysis can be a very useful tool for liquor stores to evaluate how their products are performing. It illuminates which items should be prioritized to always highlight and keep in stock. In this regard, it helps businesses realize what products and suppliers are critical to their success.
For more detailed information about this inventory management technique check out: How to Run an ABC Analysis: Find Your Top (and Worst) Performing Inventory
Use Previous Sales Data To Predict Future Needs
A powerful liquor store point of sale will automatically analyze previous sales data and customer purchase information to help you plan for the future. Select specific time periods across multiple locations, regions, or an individual store to see what’s selling the most at specific times of the year, such as around which holidays. Just how much more rosé did you sell in April versus March over the last five years? Does that mean you will also sell less full-bodied red wines once it gets hotter out?
All of this actionable insight can be plucked from sales data with KORONA POS. Get insight into the performances of specific products, categories, day of the week, and store location, among dozens of other KPIs.
All of these analyses of past sales and customer preferences will prepare you to appropriately stock the items that your customers need. They will also highlight trends in liquor demand, providing ideas for promotional marketing to get more customers into your store.
Liquor Store Industry Trends: POS With Built In KPIs
Continuously monitoring profit margins is tough in the liquor industry. Stock is constantly being replenished with new truckloads, and prices of wholesale items often change. Utilizing built-in analytics helps make sure that your prices are set at appropriate levels. This is crucial to ensuring that you actually make money!
Luckily, KORONA POS comes pre-built with an array of reporting and analytics features. We offer a fully customizable dashboard so that you can tailor your system with most relevant and best key performance indicators (KPIs) for your liquor store. Achieve a comprehensive understanding of your business health with indicators like year-over-year reports, or drill down more specific numbers regarding foot traffic for specific locations and customer spends.
These KPIs bring clarity to which areas of your business need tinkering or improvement. Did you expand your hours during pandemic shut downs when no bars or restaurants were open? Take a look at your profitability data during those extended hours and see if it’s worth it to open earlier or stay open later.
For a deeper understanding of this topic check out: 10 Important Retail KPIs for Small Businesses
Drive Your Promotions With POS Analytics
Running promotions is a marketing tool that almost all retail businesses use. However, running these types of sales and discounts without proper reporting analytics will leave you in the dark when it comes to making informed business decisions.
Make use of clear and concise sales and inventory data so that you can pinpoint which items you need to move, and at what prices. Clear shelves of old inventory and drive foot traffic to your store while maintaining the margins that you need to succeed. With time-sensitive items like India Pale Ales and sour beers, which expire quickly, this is an imperative part of liquor stores employing your point of sale data.
Liquor Store Employee Reporting
A great POS will offer KPIs to measure employee efficiency. It’s natural to have some seasoned employees who work a bit faster or upsell and cross-sell more than others. Know exactly who to schedule for the busiest periods, and who needs a bit more training and support.
End Of Day Reports
Liquor store point of sale software should also include detailed shift reports to help business owners and managers keep control over their shops. With KORONA POS, every action that each employee takes is tracked and reported on an end of day report. Any discrepancies in inventory, misuse of discounts, or cash reconciliation issues can be quickly sorted out by looking at these broken down reports.
KORONA POS Real-Time Reporting
With KORONA POS, you can access all of this reporting in real-time right from the comfort of your home, on the go, or at your favorite coffee shop. All you need to do is log in from your computer and smartphone and do all of the monitoring you need. This access is also a great tool for multi-location business owners. For more information about our dynamic and personalized reporting tools, don’t hesitate to reach out to one of our specialists. Give us a call today to schedule a demo!
