Thank you Melanie.
Your feedback is very helpful. I will check the website for more details. Would you mind to telling me the cost since you have to pay loyalty?
Thanks.
Emay
sorry its www.christianjames.net PAYGO SAAS (software as a service) We've been using it in our retail for 2 years. It has the loyalty program, gift cards, customer management wholesale and retail with photos and gobs of reports like what hrs of the day sold the most and which salesperson etc.
Our only challenge was inventory because things arrive as bulk chocolates but leave as boxed. We have our stock #'s as the boxes. So while we can't track the specific route of an individual flavor or chocolate ( we have around 40) we have a clear grasp on the box configurations that sell. All other items like bars can be tracked easily.
Hi Andy
I agree that 'registers' are outdated and don't really deliver on functionality. We use a customised software solution and run it on a good looking touch screen PC (with mini keyboard of course), and have integrated Eftpos/Credit card + printers (barcode label printer & receipt printer), which is transitioning to the cloud as we now run multiple sites. The most important factors for me in my system are:
* business intelligence - ability to see as much data as possible to track and analyze products (individual, category, or by attribute, over any period I want)
* simple, intuitive Point of Sale interface for FAST and simple processing of sales (we have put through over 700 sales in a day before). Our barcode system allows fast sanning of retail shelf products and our short number codes for our loose assorted cabinet chocolates are fast and easy to type in (we have over 120 individual flavors etc). All up we have over 600 SKUS on our system, although only 400 or so are active.
* CRM (Customer Relationship Management) we have included a bar coded loyalty card system which gives points on all purchases to customers and allows us to market to customers who buy particular items etc
There are plenty of other nice to have functionality, but if I could only have three, they would be it.
There are most certainly great opportunities in the cloud now, and I am very excited about our upcoming transition as our software moves off our PCs and into the cloud, giving me more control from our head office while still allowing stores a decent level of autonomy for daily things.
I also spent a long time looking, and there were so many bad systems, I feel lucky to have found the one I did. Thanks for your comments, made me realize I had not really elaborated on my system.
Thanks Andy for sharing your experience.
I will have over hundred of items in store. Good inventorymanagement software & POS system definitely will make things lot of easier for me. I willcheck vendhq & shopkeep's website for more information.
Emay
I use a system called Paygo. Its a cloud solution and inexpensive.
We decided to go the non-traditional route and disliked all registers--too expensive for too little. We went with Vend ( http://www.vendhq.com/ ). All you need is a laptop and you can hook it up to a receipt printer and cash drawer.
You can also look into asimilarsolution ShopKeep.( http://shopkeep.com/ )
There are a lot of web oriented solutions coming. They excel in my opinion, I can check in on all things anywhere. A lot nicer than being tied to something archaic and from a decade or more ago--or a PC solution that locks you into some high fees.
Experiment and go with what feels good to you and your business. I spent 3 months evaluating with greatdisappointmentuntil we came to web solutions.
Hi, Stu,
Thank you for your reply, and your encouragement.
I want to arrange things effectively, in order to make management easier. Thinking about how many items I will have, and how to decorate the store in a way it would be more fun and inviting, it is exciting, but can be frustrating as well.
I will do whateverit takes to get my shop ready.
Emay
Hi Emay,
I started down that path just over two years ago here in New Zealand and it has been a lot of fun! We use a POS system that was customized for us, and is made for New Zealand, so would not work over there. Just make sure you get a good, reliable system that makes it easy to track which flavors you are selling - if you just lump all your loose chocolates into one 'code' you will make forecasting and planning that much harder.
Good luck!!
Hi, Everyone,
Finally I am ready to open a candy & chocolate shop in San Mateo County, California. This is my first retail business, I would really appreciate any of your suggestions about choosing an inventory software and POS system.If you have suppliers that you like to recommend, that would be great.
Some of you might be a very experienced shop owner. I am wondering if you would be willing to share your experiences about how you do things, so I could use some expert advice.
Thank you very much for your feedbacks.
Emay
If I may comment too....
15g is pretty big for a truffle, and 30g is HUGE - especially if you dip them in chocolate and roll them in a coating of some type. Our truffle centers start as 12g, and by the time we've dipped and rolled them, the average size is around 22g. We've been accused of selling truffles of "gluttonous" proportions, so I can imagine that your 30g center will likely end up like a small baseball....
Brad
I think I have too many questions, but will you please help me AGAIN. I need to know how many "balls," whether it is truffles or fudge balls, can reasonable expected from one person to roll and dip in 1 hour? I'm finding that it does not take me any longer to roll a bigger ball than a smaller so I think on average a 30g ball should not really take longer than a 15g ball. Is my argument correct here or not?
Thanks
Magriet
hi there, I am just finding your post and would love to talk with you about your current experience using coconut sugar. I am also using it and have learned the hard way to either dehydrate the sugar first or use dessicant to get the humidity under control. I have experienced exactly what you are talking about with my cocoatown melanger, and wondered if you have upgraded to a better machine? I am looking to buy something in a larger capacity that won't break!
It has been hard to find anyone else using coconut sugar to discuss this with. thanks, Beth
Hi There,
have you checked the Humidity and the temperature?
sometimes a bit of rain or too low temp may give you problem with sugar. Have you tried to grind the sugar first to turn it into powder?
Ciao
nino
Hello!
I Have been using a Cocoa Town Melanger for a few months now, to produce cacao paste and grind coconut sugar with chocolate. I am having issues with the sugar sicking to the stone grinders. Does anyone have any experience & suggestions as to why this is occurring?
The strange fact is that my machine was producing perfect chocolate for about 2 weeks and then the sugar started sticking to the granite grinders. I have not changed any aspect of the way I am processing the chocolate. I have also experimented using different brands of sugar - the same problem occurs.
Here is a set by step as to what my process is like - 1. I add melted cacao paste to grinder 2. Add melted cacao butter 3. Add vanilla bean & salt ( I let this mix together for about an hour before I start to add the sugar) 4. Slowly add the sugar, 1 tablespoon every hour.
I would really appreciate any advice you can give me! Thank you!
~ Jade
Hi Clay, I have a very primitive setup here. I heat the chocolate in an improvised bain marie and temper it by hand with the seed method.
The market is outdoors in the morning and in the evening. No way to control the temperature. If the weather forecast can be trusted the morning temperature should be around 20C and it also looks as if humidity at about 37%. The evening is going to present a problem as the temperature is sure to drop to about 12C.
So, my chocolate is sure to go a little out of temper as the day goes. Hopefully the truffles will be consumed quickly, but I am scared it will not set soon enough.
The other night I tried to temper Valrohna for the first time, previously I have used Callebaut, and I had a serious problem. The chocolate was ice cold yet it would not set, it would have been ideal to serve as it is as a colc chocolate drink, serious! So, advice please.
Magriet:
You may have answered this in another post, but what method are you currently using to temper your chocolate, and if you are using equipment, what equipment (specifically - company and model) are you using?
Is the market indoors or outdoors and is there any temperature control?'
:: Clay
Me again, I have actually a few related questions. OK, first, if I am going to offer clients at a stall freshly dipped truffles rolled in whatever they want. Must that chocolate be perfectly tempered? I think, if not, it will not set fast enough even though we are not worried about shine as it is going to be rolled in something as well, but it still needs to set in a reasonable time. The idea for this is to try and find out what is popular for a future line we want to offer, so it is a little research as well as an effort to get some cash flow!
How do I keep sufficient chocolate hot and tempered (if I can get it in temper to start with as I am not good with it yet!) under the difficult conditions of a stall at a food market? We want to do that market as our target market goes there for entertainment.
Most important! I am so new at tempering I do not know what properly tempered chocolate looks like. I do it religiously according to the temperatures, sometimes it is not so bad and then, like last night, I end up with a fluid mass of chocolate that was only properly set this morning. My family thinks the truffles are divine, and they are difficult to please, but I cannot offer them to customers!
So, I hope you guys understand my questions as I am not very good at explaining myself.
Thanks
Magriet
Most larger insurance companies have an in-house commercial broker. Unless you are actually setting up a manufacturing facility with large automated equipment, don't mislead them with the term "manufacturing". If your sales are under $1,000,000 gross per year, you're a small chocolatier and need liability insurance. That's it. It's a low risk business, and shouldn't cost you any more than around $1200 per year for as much as $5,000,000 liability.
Did anybody go through this process in the state of FL? Any info is greatly appreciated. Thanks
We just went through this and it took several months to get a simple quote out of a company. You're supposed to go to an insurance consolidator or broker who then shops your requirements around to different companies for the best quote. You could try someone like Pyramid Insurance or http://www.mutualunderwriters.com/ .
They'll ask you all kinds of questions about your company like income, employees, equipment, etc. to get you an appropriate quote.
Good luck!
Hi everyone!
I am new here, but I just wanted to ask those of you with small businesses where to get liability insurance? I did an internet search and so far havent turned up much info on this. Is there an insurance company that specializes in confectionary manufacturing? Thanks so much for any information you can give.
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Eddie Hernandez
If it was bars for eating you bought, they're ruined (but just for immediate eating! They can still be salvaged for working)
If it's for working with, no problem. Just re-melt and temper. Should be good as new.
Tim -
I don't have any connection with Thermalrite and from a quick glance at their web site all they are selling are the Desmon pizza prep tables so I am not sure there is a fit there.
Irinox is gold standard - very expensive, but they do the job very well. They are expensive like a cooling tunnel is expensive but the footprint is a lot smaller. The Desmon products are less expensive but not all of them have humidity control, which is important in most parts of the country for at least some of the year.
In the end it all comes down to airflow, cooling load, and "recovery time." Airflow is about the ability to remove what's called the latent heat of crystallization, the heat that comes off the chocolate as it cools. You want the chocolate in the mold to cool consistently and evenly to ensure proper crystal formation and to reduce the likelihood of de-molding problems.
Cooling load is a measure of the amount of heat that can be removed. Think of an air conditioner and a room. A small AC unit might be able to cool the room but it might take a long time. Put four or five people in the room (or a window) and it might not be able to keep up. So, you need a cooling unit that is sized to the amount of heat that will be added to the system (in the form of warm chocolate).
Recovery time is important for cooling units with doors on them. As most doors are hinged and swing open, that action extracts a lot of cool air from the unit that is replaced with warmer air from the room. The question is how long does it take for the unit to return to the set temperature?
There are many different ways to approach cooling and it all depends on throughput and space. If you have the room and you need to move a lot of product, cooling tunnels are very good solutions. Lots of people I know build cabinets or even large rooms. You can use household AC units (split systems are good) and the CoolBot [Note: that's an affiliate link] will enable you take the household AC units below 60F, which is normally their lowest temperature.
There are a couple of ChocolateLife customers who are also building "static cooling tunnels" that I came up with the idea for. These are enclosed wire shelves (e.g., Metro shelving) under positive pressure from a cooling unit. The nice thing about these is that they can buy wheels for the units and move them around as needed.
Omar,
I guess the question really is how long are you needing to store your chocolates? We store chocolates in wine coolers for a max of about a week, restocking our store inventory from them (which are kept in confectionary showcases) If I overproduce I freeze chocolate to stop the shelf life clock as they can easily be defrosted in a few days. We have never had any problems with either solution. I use wine coolers in the $500 range quite successfully.We are constantly producing and turning over the inventory, I don't think you want it in storage too long with freezing.
