There are various reasons retailers around the world are now migrating to advanced POS systems. For the first time in history, relatively cheap, high bandwidth connections are available to virtually any store location. There also are simply more POS options — more advanced, and affordable hardware, easy-to-use software — that give retailers new capacity to track, speed up and advance store promotions and sales. So instead of antique DOS or mainframe relay systems running across slow dial-up or satellite connections, high-speed connections are allowing retailers to quickly ring up sales and keep customers moving through. Additionally, those high-speed pipes allow information to quickly travel between the POS systems at retail locations and company headquarters. This gives corporations nearly instantaneous feedback and insight into sales trends, and the ability to quickly react to changes in the retail environment.
Some of these advances stem from lessons learned through e-commerce operations. Developed over the past five to 10 years, e-commerce admittedly makes up a small proportion of retail sales, at just 5.5 percent. But for many mainstream retailers, the sheer mass of those sales can in fact equal that of up to 30 individual locations. Retailers realize that the efficiency gains and customer service operations gleaned through e-commerce improvements can have a massive and positive influence on how changes are made at retail locations. POS is at the heart of these changes.