Oh, the wonderful things that you can do with an iPad. Business partners Steve Escobar and Hugo Salazar wanted their own restaurant in New York to stand out. Their strategy was to make their restaurant look cool while saving money at the same time. So they installed a point-of-sale system from POSLavu that uses Apple devices in place of a much more expensive traditional restaurant POS system. Instead of the traditional sales terminals that most restaurants have, the Brooklyn Tap House uses three iPads at the bar and 10 iPod touch devices carried by their wait staff. According to co-owner Salazar, what compelled them to use POSLavu system is the price.
Many restaurants use other systems that cost $20,000 and even more. Salazar said that the POSLavu’s iPad POS only cost $7,000. Both partners say that the system has a lot of advantages, two of them being smoother and faster. Orders are apparently taken wirelessly from the iPod touch device in the hands of wait staff and then printed in the kitchen. Another benefit is that their inventory system is constantly updated and that they can literally check sales in a snap. But, as with other technologies, there’s a downside as well. One obvious problem is Wi-Fi connectivity timeouts, although it rarely happens. Also, customers often think that their wait staff is busy texting instead of taking their orders, the partners added. Check out the iPad POS system in action below (video is not taken from the Brooklyn Tap House restaurant).