A Store with a View

Along the banks of the Hudson River on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, Trump Place stands alone as one of the premier residential complexes in this high-end, exclusive community.  Developed by Donald Trump and stretching along the scenic waterfront from 59^th Street to 72^nd Street, the 49-story high complex offers both luxury condominiums and apartments.

Among the many amenities offered are a private park, spa, garden, reading rooms, and children’s playrooms.  Recently, the complex has added Trump Marketplace, a grocery and high-end convenience store serving the residents of Trump Place.  The 2,500sq. foot store also functions as a café, serving coffee, sandwiches, and homemade pastries.

But unlike the technologically advanced, state-of-the-art buildings it serves, Trump Marketplace was lagging far behind when it came to its point-of-sale and inventory control systems.

 “We really didn’t have anything in place to help us keep track of sales or inventory,” says Joela Campbell, general manager at Trump Marketplace.  “We pretty much did it all by hand.”

Enter Itel Register Systems, a Bronx, TX-based reseller of POS hardware and software, which offered a solution from distributor Budget POS (Houston, TX) in order to get the market up to speed with both point-of-sale transactions and inventory control.

“They contacted us and after we asked a few questions and gave them a demonstration they knew what they wanted,” says Alex Sanchez, operations manager at Itel Register Systems.  “We explained to them the benefits behind having multiple workstations and they also liked the security features that are built into the system.

“We put in four workstations, one in the kitchen, two out on the main floor and one in the back-office.  All the equipment is touch screen -based with a touch screen  interface and several options are available.  Everything is networked and they’re online.”

The system is comprised of touch screen s from Gvision running Budget POS’s Cash Register Express POS software, along with bar code scanners from Metrologic, thermal printers from Samsung, magnetic-card readers from ID Tech, Internet credit-card processing and a touch screen invoicing feature that allows the cashier to quickly and easily ring up items that do not have a barcode.  Each workstation is also equipped with a cash drawer that’s connected to the system and a UPS to help prevent data loss.

Another valuable system feature is a portable inventory collection system (Pocket Register/Pocket Inventory software from Budget POS, utilizing hardware from Symbol Technologies) that allows employees to move throughout the store and scan items without actually having to print out a report.  Instead, it can provide a report in real-time and immediately alert the employee if a particular item is out of stock, overstocked, or if there’s shrinkage.

Itel Register Systems completed the installation in March, and since that time Campbell and her staff have been reaping the benefits.  Both Itel Register Systems and Budget POS provide ongoing support.

“The register system gives us the opportunity to keep track of what’s being sold throughout the day and from hour to hour,” says Campbell.  “So the benefit for us is we can have more of a detailed account of what’s going on in the store, what employees are doing, and who’s doing what.

“It also allows us to quickly find out how much we’ve sold.  Having everything tallied up so we don’t have to do it ourselves leaves us free to do more things around the store.  If we scan everything and we do it properly, everything runs more smoothly.”

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