FloristWare Newsletters: November 2005

This is our first newsletter. It is designed to help our users get the most out of the FloristWare Order-Taking and Point-Of-Sale system and keep them informed of important developments.

The last few months have been very exciting. After more than fours years of development and testing we released the FloristWare Point-Of-Sale system in August 2005.

The response has far exceeded our expectations. In fact it has been overwhelming! We thought that we had a concept, a product and an approach florists would like and we’re thrilled to see they really do.

If you are receiving this newsletter you are probably a FloristWare user. We want to make sure that you are getting the most out of the FloristWare system and keep you up-to-date with any FloristWare news.

Or you may be a florist who has expressed an interest in FloristWare. If that is the case we want you to see what you are missing!

This newsletter will only get better. Future editions will be bigger and include some very valuable marketing tips for all florists - whether they use FloristWare or not.

You can also download this newsletter in pdf format

Introducing SamDavid Idar

We are very pleased to announce that SamDavid Idar has joined the FloristWare team. Based in Texas, he will be working with florists throughout the Southern USA.

Version 1.7: Coming Early December

The next version of FloristWare includes many powerful new features. It will be released in early December 2005.

What are you doing in January?

The slow month of January is the perfect time to test the FloristWare demo or make the switch to the full version. If you have been putting things off January is the time to make it happen! Please contact us to get started.

On October 14th FloristWare 1.6 was made available for download from our website. This new version is our third major release in as many months.

There are many new features but the shortcuts have proven to be the most exciting for our users.

While everybody could see right away that FloristWare was easy to use some people felt it involved a lot of mouse work. “Too many clicks” they said.

The shortcuts take care of that. You can now speed through the most common processes (taking orders, making sales, etc.) only rarely reaching for your mouse. This makes FloristWare much faster to use.

Another exciting new feature is the delivery notification tool. You could always use FloristWare to track an order through production and delivery. You can now notify customers once their delivery has been made.

Version 1.6 also gives you more options when dealing with receipts and invoices. You can now print them (already formatted to go in a window envelope) or fax or e-mail them directly to the customer from within FloristWare.

To see the shortcuts and all the other new features in action please visit our website and download a demo.

Version 1.7 is even better! It will be released in early December 2005

Did you know that FloristWare works with touch-screen monitors?

A touch-screen monitor is entirely optional but they make using FloristWare even faster and a lot of fun. All you have to do is plug in a touch-screen monitor and you’re ready to start tapping. If you are interested please contact us - we have arranged for special discounts on this and other POS hardware.

As you probably know FloristWare generates many different reports. As useful as these reports are there is a simple trick that makes them even more beneficial.

FloristWare almost always gives you the option of sorting lists and reports in not just one but many different ways.

For example, when you look at a report you will see that each column of information has a header that describes the contents of that column.

For example, the Sales By Product report has column headers that read “Product Name”, “Item Count”, etc.

You will notice that some of these headers appear in blue text. Clicking on a blue header will sort the report by the contents of that column.

If for example you clicked the blue “Product Name” header FloristWare will sort the list of products alphabetically from A to Z. If you click the same header again it will reverse the sort order - in this case from Z to A.

It works the same way with numbers. If you clicked on a blue header that read “Item Count” FloristWare will sort the list by the contents of the item count column. Clicking it once will sort the list from high to low and clicking it again will sort it from low to high.

In another example, the Staff Performance report shows you staff performance for both sales and production. Clicking on a sales header will show you your best (or worst) salespeople. Clicking a production header will show you your best (or worst) producers.

FloristWare will also print reports in whatever order they were last sorted.

Try it! This feature can save you a lot of time and help you make the most of all those reports.

For more tips and tricks please visit the Forums section of our website. There you can read suggestions from other FloristWare users and post your own.

Next Month:

Using Customer Summaries To Maximize Sales

We speak with our users everyday and certain questions keep coming up. We’re going to try and answer at least one of these questions in each newsletter.

One of the questions we are asked most frequently concerns the order-taking process. Some florists think FloristWare makes them take orders backwards!

When developing FloristWare we tried to make sure it works the way you work. We didn’t want you to have to do things differently. There were a few times we had to bend this rule and the order process was one.

When most florists take an order they start with what the customer wants to send - because this is the part of the order that is most interesting to the customer and florist.

FloristWare gets the where and who first. While this is a departure for most florists there is a very good reason.

We get the where first because we want to make sure you can fill the order before you waste a lot of time. We spent a lot of time in shops and too often we saw florists spend twenty minutes haggling over prices and the number of roses they could put in an arrangement only to realize they wouldn’t be able to fill it at all because the customer wanted it delivered across town in 10 minutes.

We also need to know whether you will be filling the order yourself or sending it out by wire - this can affect not only pricing but design considerations as well.

Next we look at who is sending the order. This is vital because it lets you see our notes on this customer allowing you to serve them better.

It also lets you see their spending history which allows you to always make the biggest possible sale. If a customer spends a $120 on average you need to know that before you start talking product - otherwise you might end up selling them a $30 bouquet when they were prepared to spend much more!

Getting the customer name also gives you access to all the recipient information including order histories, notes (what they like / what they don’t) as well as the customer’s spending pattern as it pertains to that recipient.

Taking the order in this sequence is the only way to guarantee the highest possible level of customer service and the biggest possible sale. If this is not important to you probably shouldn’t even bother with a POS system.