Chowly, headquartered in Chicago, integrates 3rd party online ordering apps with restaurant POS applications, providing a consistent ordering system.
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Toast Point of Sale
Score 7.2 out of 10
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Toast Point of Sale is a cloud-based restaurant point of sale solution provided as the foundation for Toast's all in one restaurant management solution which supports payment processing, as well as customer care, gift cards and loyalty, as well as back of house and back office (HR, payroll, schedule and shift management, etc.).
Chowly was not as good as Checkmate, though I cannot in good faith recommend either. We ended up switching over to Checkmate after a year with Chowly due to our dissatisfaction with the service.
I would not recommend Chowly to any restaurant that is trying to push orders through to their POS from a third party delivery site. Any restaurant would be much better off finding a third party site that integrates directly with their POS. Using Chowly was more of a headache than it needed to be and our company switched to Checkmate (also not great) after a year with Chowly.
For restaurants it's great, and that's the only scenario I'm really use to seeing it. However I do have to say that during Christmas time, our city has a craft bizarre where local artists are featured and sell their wares, and this Bizarre was using Toast POS. Therefore, I think it can really span across all avenues. It's great because of how it categorizes menus, and how you can run reports like a p-mix to see your top sellers, and bottom sellers, etc. The more I think of it, now, really any business that sells something and needs to track those sales, could use this POS. A tire store? Sure. A hat shop? Absolutely. The great thing about Toast is that it is just SO customizable! You can even make the buttons different colors, that's how customizable it is. Lastly, the ability to sell online has been a game-changer. I wish there was a little bit better formatting for online ordering, but really, you can add pictures, descriptions, modifiers, use discount codes, and accept gift cards all online. We didn't have to build out an online store, we just had to build out our menu buttons and we were all set.
Though sales details are available in real time, the analytics take 2-3 days to post. So if you are looking for specific modifications you'll have to wait.
Though you can edit the menus directly from the devices and move them around like you do on a smartphone, it doesn't give you a sorting option. If you're OCD like me, you have to alphabetize my hand.
There are many features I wish Toast had that it currently does not, but we are likely to renew this year because given Toast's recent increase in funding and expanding of their staff, we are hopeful some of these issues will finally be resolved in 2019. Plus, though I've never done it, I'd imagine that switching to another POS system would take a ton of time, money, and resources---things most businesses don't have a lot of. So we'll sit tight with Toast for now and see what they come up with this year in terms of fixing our biggest pain-points.
Toast POS is a great basic POS tool, having some features I didn't think would be possible at this price point, such as:
processing CC payments in "offline mode" in case there is an internet outage
kitchen display screens
collecting payment from customers using a handheld right at their table
pre-approving card payments to assure the customer has enough money to pay for their order, etc
That being said, I still feel that Toast misses the mark on some things that I truly would consider 'common-sense' features, such as:
providing hardware that connects the Register Screen (Elo) to the Cash drawer so it doesn't fall off the table when flipped over for customer signature
accepting physical and e-gift cards as payment on their own online ordering platform (ToastOO)
a Rewards Program that allows for online enrollment, rather than holding up quick-serve lines to sign up
a Promo code feature that allows you to add basic restrictions such as Limit 1 per customer, or date/time limitations
increasing in-store operations efficiency by creating more straight-forward ways to manage restaurant/ToastOO hours, and Delivery/Takeout quote estimates
Facing these issues after 3+ years has been a frustration. We hope Toast has some solutions in mind that they will be implementing in 2019.
Chowly was not as good as Checkmate, though I cannot in good faith recommend either. We ended up switching over to Checkmate after a year with Chowly due to our dissatisfaction with the service.
Toast is so much easier to use than Breadcrumb. The display is so much easier to navigate. The card readers are more quality with Toast. Chownow was hard because it had its own printer, different than our kitchen printer, for to go orders, but now with Toast's all in one ordering we get the to go orders sent to the kitchen with the same ease as if they were getting fired from the main floor.
