7 Best Convenience Store Management Software For Multi-Unit Operators

Best Convenience Store Management Software For Multi-Unit Business Operators

The following convenience software are known for their overall robust features, affordability, and a combination of different things that turn guesswork into great work!

Later on, we have also discussed some of the important aspects of convenience store management through digital solutions, so that if it's your first time using one such program, you won't have a hard time getting acquainted with the right solution.

1. Xenia - C Store Solution For Multi Unit Operators

If you’re looking for a powerful, yet intuitive, all-in-one operations management platform tailored for convenience store management, look no further than Xenia.

Designed to enhance communication, streamline daily operations, and provide actionable insights for better decision-making, Xenia takes multi-location management to a whole new level.

But how does Xenia do that? 

Through the integration of field, store, and remote office operations into a cohesive system, Xenia helps drive efficiency, consistency, and superior customer experiences across all locations. 

Some of our most prominent features to help stores scale include store task management, detailed store management templates and checklists, real-time communication, and up-to-date reporting. 

Moreover, by scaling daily operations, improving communication, and providing valuable insights, the c-store software ensures high-quality and consistent customer experiences, ultimately driving revenue and business scalability. 

1. Automate Daily Operations: Streamlined day-to-day operations are key to ensuring the smooth running of convenience stores across multiple locations. Digitized checklists and reports simplify these processes, giving GMs a better understanding of what’s happening on the store floor.

This way they can enhance response time, simplify workflow, and gain a comprehensive view of store operations. 

Here’s how these fully customizable checklists can benefit your convenience store:

• Store opening and closing checklists
• Product expiration checklists
• Damaged product template
• Store cleaning checklists
• Store maintenance checklist

By storing all your checklists digitally, you can easily retrieve data whenever it's needed.

For example, if your designated store manager asks for a certain procedure, such as a store cleaning activity performed on a specific date, you can quickly find the exact information in the application, avoiding the hassle of sifting through paper records.

This area is based on a recurring activity to maintain a certain standard of upkeep for the store - since it impacts the customer experience. Checklists, in this regard, offer a quick and efficient way of getting things done, daily, without relying on a paper-based trail of tasks.

2. Standardize Work Orders Across All Locations: Moving on, manage store work order requests seamlessly with this software. From receiving and approving to assigning and tracking, our platform allows you to efficiently handle requests from team members.. 

Enable requesters to submit, track, and communicate with your team without accessing operations templates or unrelated work orders.

• Transparent Reporting: Compile and export detailed request reports for transparency and informed decision-making.‍
• Detailed View: Access detailed information about inbound requests, including status, location, and descriptions.‍
• Approve and Assign: Approve requests and assign them to the appropriate teams.‍
• Image Requests: Include image requests in the work order for due diligence.

3. Streamline Communication: Effective communication is the backbone of any retail operation. 

Whether it’s from headquarters to store managers, HR, or department heads to the team, or convenience store managers to employees, this store management solution provides robust communication tools such as in-app chat and provides:

• Employee Directory: Easily search for team members' and managers’ contact details within the app, keeping personal and work contacts separate and up-to-date.‍
• Chat Groups and Channels: Facilitate efficient day-to-day communication by creating specific groups for each department, allowing you to separate work life from private life.‍
• Realtime Push Notifications and Updates: Keep everyone informed with both formal (team goals, new items, promotions) and informal (birthdays, weddings) announcements.

Ready to streamline your operations and manage work orders effortlessly? 

Features

• Operations Templates
• Tasks & Work Orders
• Inspections & Audits
• Temperature Monitoring
• SOP & AI-Powered Writer
• Document & Records Management
• Reporting

Pricing

• Free Forever: For the first 5 users with access to all the basic features
• Starter: $99 / month for the first 15 users with access to core features 
• Premium: $199 / month for the first 15 users with unlimited access to all the core & advanced features
• Custom: Need something tailored to your organization?

Book a Free Demo Today!

2. Zenput

Zenput enables operations at 50,000 sites across 40 countries for the largest restaurants, groceries, convenience shops, and other retail chains across the world. 

Their technology for convenience store operations execution optimizes task, audit, and incident management to increase productivity and equip field and store staff to do their tasks effectively.

The platform provides multi-unit operators with strong operations capabilities. 

Their data-driven platform lets you know precisely what's going on in each shop so you can make wise business choices and increase income. It also offers insights into top-performing workers and locations, highlights areas for development, and more.

Features

• Task Management: Gain confidence that tasks are carried out accurately and on schedule in the shops and fields. Equip staff to be more responsible and time-efficient by centrally assigning, monitoring, and reporting on recurring and ad hoc tasks across all locations.‍
• Audits & Corrective Action: Conduct efficient store audits to establish responsibility and uphold strict standards. With automatic follow-up tasks and resolution tracking, you can keep an eye on problems and avoid them falling between the cracks. Gain real-time insight into job completion rates and performance across all locations.‍
• Incident Management: Acquire incident reports from workers in the field and in shops instantly, set up alarms to alert management, and follow problems through to completion. Give your staff more authority by making it simple for them to use their mobile devices to take pictures, record information, and make reports.

Pricing

• Contact Zenput for a detailed pricing plan

3. Jolt

With Jolt, you can easily digitize and simplify convenience shop operations overnight by combining sophisticated label printing with a tablet-based POS software solution. 

Businesses often collaborate with Jolt to convert from paper-based to digital checklists.

Jolt also has an effective training library, a drag-and-drop planner, and a face-recognition time clock. 

The program provides company owners and managers with the necessary insights to establish and oversee a profitable convenience shop by including time stamps on each label that is created. With Jolt, inventory management is made simple, productivity is increased, and waste is reduced.

Key Features

• Jolt Lists: A task management system that is simple to use, well-organized, and allows users to create, assign, and monitor tasks—all of which boost employee responsibility and productivity.‍
• Streamlined Scheduling: An easy-to-use interface with customizable choices and seamless platform integration for managing productive work schedules across many locations. ‍
• Jolt Time Clock: With GPS position monitoring assuring precise timekeeping, the integrated time clock function enables workers to punch in from a variety of devices, including mobile applications. 

Pricing

• Jolt customizes its offerings depending on your exact needs.

4. KORONA

Cashiers can concentrate their efforts on delivering exceptional customer service since KORONA's POS claims the fastest checkout speed in the retail industry. 

When to reorder and how to set up future orders to maintain ideal stock levels are two things that their POS system's intelligent inventory management can assist you with.

The cloud-based POS system from KORONA also has automatic order placing, robust product importation, and label and tag printing capabilities. In addition, KORONA can examine and recalculate the optimal reorder levels according to patterns, seasons, and previous purchases. To sum up, this program takes the uncertainty and time out of inventory management for your convenience business.

Key Features

• Mobile Retail Inventory Management: Use the KORONA POS inventory mobile app or do inventory counts straight from your point of sale to avoid spreadsheets and difficult imports.‍
• Detailed Sales Reports and Metrics: Obtain comprehensive store-specific reports or aggregate data to obtain a comprehensive understanding of your business activities. ‍
• Prevent Overstocking and Understocking: In order to ensure that you never have an excess of any product, slow seller reports highlight which goods aren't selling. Additionally, KORONA POS will alert you to assist you in maintaining the proper stock level.

Pricing

• KORONA POS Core: $59/month‍
• KORONA POS Retail: $69/month

5. Leaf.Io

The LEAFIO AI Retail Platform, a leading convenience store software, empowers you to set up your replenishment system in the "empty warehouse" mode. 

It allows you to build a multi-echelon supply chain, efficiently distributing stocks between stores to minimize balances and frozen funds. 

The platform ensures optimal availability for each SKU with highly accurate forecasts and helps form product displays considering current balances, maintaining stock levels until the next delivery. 

In addition to that, it automatically creates planograms to maximize the margin per meter or foot of shelf space. The platform also aids in selecting the optimum assortment under varying conditions.

Key Features

• Inventory Optimization: Maintain autonomous inventory balances at every stage of the supply chain to easily satisfy customer demands.‍
• Shelf Efficiency: Automate the creation of your planograms and take total control of your merchandising operation, from planning to execution.‍
• Assortment Performance: Make an assortment plan, then use deep analytics and an AI assistant to oversee and improve it.

Pricing

• Contact vendor for detailed pricing.

6. ePB

ePB, cloud-based convenience store software, streamlines your store's operational tasks by integrating all your systems in one place – and it does so for any number of stores. 

From employee scheduling of your labor management system, and comprehensive store analytics to syncing your inventory in real-time, ePB is the solution.

Managers can access a store's vital information from anywhere in the world. Loaded with powerful features that eliminate the guesswork from running a C-store, the software can do it all

But it doesn't stop there. With daily sales tracking honed to perfection, the most precise tobacco rebate and loyalty reporting ever, and an unrivaled array of additional features, it’s like having a hyper-imaginative assistant working ceaselessly to keep your store on the up and up.

Key Features 

• Daily reconciliation guarantees that all transactions are recorded accurately and finances are leveled with ease
• Precise inventory control helps store owners track stock levels, manage reorders, and reduce waste.
• Store merchandising tools optimize product placement to maximize sales opportunities.
• Detailed shop analytics gives you deep insights into sales trends, customer behaviors, and overall store performance.

Pricing 

• Contact Vendor

7.  Heartland Retail

Previously named Springboard Retail, this CRM software is the runner-up for the next best convenience store software designed for multi-store and multi-channel retailers. 

This retail solution is designed to keep up with the ever-evolving demands of today’s retail landscape.

Heartland Retail POS offers a customer dashboard, which is capable of providing valuable insight into customer behavior by gathering information right at the point of sale. 

That information is then used to generate averages about such things as what the customer likes and what their history of purchases shows. With an unlimited number of custom fields, tracking and reporting can be altered to match any business's individual needs.

Key Features 

• Streamlined buying process with comprehensive purchasing features.
• Improved customer relationships and detailed insights with customer management tools.
• Informed decision-making through valuable data with advanced analytics.
• Overall store operations are enhanced by efficient management features.
• Accuracy and real-time sales data with robust sales tracking.

Pricing 

• Contact Vendor 

How are Convenience Stores Different From Traditional Stores?

Retail, grocery, and convenience businesses serve various purposes. In grocery shops, customers can get a variety of home or food items.

Convenience shops, on the other hand, serve customers who need just one or two items. There is no need for a trolley since most consumers will just purchase a few products by paying cash or having them logged in the register. 

However, as retail enterprises shift to digital platforms, convenience store management software has become indispensable. It is also for convenience shops to include parts of retail and hospitality into their operations, where efficiency is critical.

Key Areas To Consider When Evaluating Convenience Store Management Software

Three important factors need to be taken into account when choosing the right technology for your store: execution, communication, and improvement. 

Here's why it's important to pay attention to these details and how to make sure the store management software system you choose is capable of doing the job.

1. Robust Communication Channels

Trends evolve rapidly. One day you're trying to add an extra checkout queue in the first aisle, and the next, you're installing separators and spacing waiting lines six feet apart.

The need for real-time communication is the one thing that managing a pandemic has taught us.

The success of your business depends on your capacity to inform employees and customers about issues like updated health and safety procedures or recalled products.

Furthermore, it involves more than simply getting communications out fast; it also involves making sure that they are understood and responded to in a timely way.

What to look for

Choose a system or restaurant solution that you to:

• Instantaneously notify every store, department, or employee of important news, updates, and announcements.
• Whether you're updating a weekly food safety evaluation or introducing a new sanitization process, instantly implement or roll out a daily or weekly procedure to every shop.
• Configure mobile devices to send out automatic notifications to employees when equipment malfunctions, temperatures exceed limits, or in other situations. 

2. Drives Execution and Ensure Compliance

Corporate brands demand franchisees to consistently roll out and successfully execute new strategies and initiatives across dozens, hundreds, and even thousands of sites.

The chance of mistakes increases with the number of stores involved.

Zenput and Technomic polled hundreds of operators in 2021 on the daily execution problems they deal with.

Only 20% of franchisee operators characterized their businesses' compliance as "very effective," even though seven out of ten felt that adhering to SOPs was essential to provide a consistent customer experience. 

Whether the work is a one-time event, such as replacing a damaged shop fixture, or it is planned and recurrent, such as daily HACCP inspections, excellent store management software makes it simple to assign, create, and track the fulfillment of tasks.

What to look for

Choose a system that enables you to:

• Create and modify digital forms, checklists, audits, and more. 
• Immediately provide your teams with access to the most current versions from any location.
• Using your smartphone, track work order completion rates in real-time by store, district, or whole business.
• Get automatic notifications when tasks are performed or done improperly.
• Keep track of remedial measures to promote responsibility and guarantee prompt resolution.
• Take pictures to provide rapid visual confirmation of the quality of the completed store tasks. 
• Remotely check for signs of food safety, such as label expiry dates and temperatures

3. Prioritizes Opportunities for Improvement Through Corrective Actions

In the end, the shop management software system you choose should facilitate data-driven decision-making by the leadership team over how to enhance and expand the business's operations. 

Accurate, up-to-date performance and compliance insights can assist in identifying possible problems before they become more serious and, in the process, can also highlight important coaching opportunities.

What to look for

It is essential that field teams can allocate, monitor, and evaluate audit outcomes across your business, and use this information to monitor advancements made against predetermined brand targets and goals. 

Choose a store management system that offers:

• A dashboard that shows shop performance and compliance around the clock from anywhere.
• Reporting that is role-specific and targeted to help field managers monitor developments and spot functional patterns.
• Both quantitative and qualitative performance data, enable them to assess the frequency, speed, and effectiveness of job completion and make appropriate adjustments.

How to Select the Right Convenience Store Software?

Before we talk about common key features of a convenience store software, bear in mind that these are just examples.

Depending on your business’s exact requirements, you may not need inventory management or a POS system integration. Instead, you may find yourself looking for robust convenience store software with a store task management system, the ability to conduct inspections and audits, and vice versa.

Therefore, feel free to improvise by matching your business needs against the C-store software you are looking for.

Inventory Management 

• Opt for software that can give visibility into your inventory levels in real-time, so you can keep track of stock accurately and avoid stockouts.
• Make sure the system features automated replenishment to automate your reordering process as it will generate purchase orders and reorder points based on demand forecasts and sales data.
• Advanced inventory management systems use forecasting algorithms to estimate future demand, The built-in forecasting tool helps you increase sales by identifying trends and seasonal patterns, etc.

POS System 

• The POS system should facilitate a smooth and efficient checkout process, minimizing wait times and enhancing customer satisfaction.
• Support for multiple payment methods, including credit/debit cards, mobile payments, and cash, ensures flexibility and convenience for customers.
• Incorporating loyalty program features allows convenience stores to reward loyal customers, encourage repeat business, and gather valuable customer data for targeted marketing campaigns.

Employee Management 

• Look for software with robust scheduling tools that allow managers to ensure adequate staff is on hand to meet demand at all times.
• Automated time card tracking allows managers to calculate payroll accurately and saves employees the hassle of filling in their hours on paper.
• Managers should evaluate employee performance by accessing data collected by the POS system. Access to KPIs helps easily identify areas where certain staff members may need improvement.
• Embedding training modules within the software promotes continuous employee development, ensuring all staff is equipped with the latest skills to deliver great food and service.

Analytics & Reports Hub

94% of business and enterprise analytics professionals say data and analytics are critical to their store’s digital transformation programs.

By gaining insights into sales performance, product trends, and customer behavior that can be derived from comprehensive sales analytics tools, managers can make data-driven decisions and optimize product offerings.

Sufficiently detailed inventory reports give a clear sense of stock levels, turnover rates, and shrinkage so that managers can spot inefficiencies and devise strategies to improve their operations.

The software should ideally provide actionable insights derived from data analysis that is beneficial for managers to identify growth opportunities, cost savings as well as operational improvements.

Integrations 

Compatibility with other software is a significant factor for the proper working of a company. 

The software should accommodate other software so have a good flow. While purchasing such software, it should be checked that it is compatible with accounting software, ERP systems, and e-commerce platforms in case of having that software.

What are the Benefits of Convenience Store Software?

1. Keeping Your Stock Available 

Convenience stores stock a wide variety of products. Still, the scope of this disparate inventory can push operational capabilities to the limit; the complexities of managing shipments from foreign suppliers can be daunting.

Average inventory record accuracy in U.S. retail stands at 63%, resulting in costly inefficiencies and lost sales.

Another major area where most convenience store managers suffer is the product stockout challenge.  Shoppers will abandon and may never return to purchase on brief delay, which requires line managers to optimize their stock of the bestselling products and staples while avoiding a surplus.

To keep track of inventors, managers need an accurate view of the product sales mix, your inventory choices aren’t practical to your business needs and don’t help build trust with customers.

It’s kind of a catch-22. How do you get an accurate view of product sales when manual processes and rogue pricing limit your visibility?

As soon as customer’s top-selling products like Pringles are getting low, you'll be alerted so that you can replenish it and keep the sales running. This can double your profits. Cha-Ching!

Also, Automated systems keep an eye on volatile pricing trends, identify the buying habits of your customers, and stay competitive in the C-store industry.

2. No More Employee Theft

Let’s Face it, employee theft is a drag. Sick of it yet?

 You trust your team, but sometimes things vanish and you can’t begin to fathom how, or why. 

That time you noticed a bunch of packs of gum and cigarettes were gone from the shelf. 

You thought maybe it was an accident, but then it just kept happening, and you knew something was up. You trust your team, but now you’re wondering if it’s John, always shooting the breeze with customers, or Emily, always restocking the shelves. You’re frustrated, desperate to figure out how to make sure it never happens again, and worried about how much it’s costing your store.

Well, to make it easy for you;

Employee theft is the cause of more than 30% of all business bankruptcies.

One way that convenience store software increases staff accountability significantly is through employee permission management. With this function, store owners and managers can assign certain permissions to each employee, so they can access only the parts of the software they need to do their job.

For example, convenience store managers can stop their staff from seeing the cash office, or the inventory room, unless the employee is authorized.

Team monitoring is another critical factor in staff accountability. The software provides real-time tracking and reporting to track employee activities, sales performance, and customer interactions. 

3. Equipment Management 

When running a C-store, it is important to keep everything neat, so there are no accidents or annoyances. Plus, there are those pesky occupational safety laws to worry about. 

Every machine or piece of equipment in a C-store must be labeled with a safety inspection sticker before it can be used. 

A convenience store assistant helps you by keeping track of repairs & maintenance that need to be scheduled. It will send alerts/notifications so you are never surprised when something breaks down. You can even schedule monthly PMs so problems are avoided and things are cleaned.     

Wait there is more. C-Store software keeps them compliant with auditing agencies. You make sure you pass inspections while scanning through regulations step by step. 

4. A Delightful Customer Experience 

When it comes to making your convenience store a success, CRM (Customer Relationship Management) is the primary answer. You see, customers love feeling special, and what’s more special than accumulating points and discounts just for being a loyal member? It’s like a VIP pass to your store. 

93% of customers are more likely to be patient with shipping delays if they see great customer service from your brand. 

C-store software with CRM-integrated data feeds can deliver timely, relevant assistance and updates, to keep your customers happy and engaged. Putting the right investment in CRM tools ensures high customer care and retention.

Over To You

And there you have it.

Some of the best convenience store software that you can sign up for easily - and that too, without chucking up a huge amount of money upfront. 

By the way, if it’s your first time transitioning to a digital solution for your convenience store, we recommend going on a trialing spree.

Check each platform of your choice through a free account for evaluation purposes. Once you are satisfied with your desired c store software, simply move on to a paid plan that you feel comfortable with, and take things from there.

Good luck!