The second site is where a lot of café owners discover the limits of their till. One shop could run on habit and the owner being there. Two shops mean you can't be in both, the menu has to stay the same in two places, and the question "how did we do today?" now has two answers that need adding up.
This is what a POS needs to do once you run more than one venue, and what to check before you open the second one.
One menu, with room for local differences
The biggest saving of a multi-site POS is editing the menu once. Change a price or add a seasonal drink, and it appears at every site. Without that, someone retypes every change on every till, and sooner or later the two shops sell the same flat white at different prices by accident.
But the sites will rarely be identical. The smaller shop may not have an oven, or a city-centre site may charge more. Look for:
- Hiding an item at one site while it stays on sale at the other.
- A different price at one site without making a duplicate item.
- The same changes reaching every channel: the till, table ordering and online orders.
Each site keeps its own day
Shared menus are good. Shared takings are not. Each venue needs its own:
- Tables and QR codes, so an order never lands at the wrong shop.
- Kitchen screen and printers, showing only that site's orders.
- Cash drawer and cash-up, so you know which shop was over or short.
- Opening hours, and a way to pause ordering at one site without closing the other.
Online ordering needs care too. If customers can order for collection, the order page should ask which shop they are collecting from before they start.
Staff who work at one site, or both
With two venues, staff management gets more involved. Some people work at one shop, some cover both, and a manager may oversee everything. Check whether you can:
- Restrict a person to one site, so they only see that venue's orders and till.
- Give managers a view across every site.
- Keep one login per person rather than separate accounts for each venue.
- See hours worked per person, if staff clock in on the system.
Stock and dish costs per site
One café can sometimes get by with a weekly look in the storeroom. Two cannot, because stock now moves between sites and it is easy to run out at one while the other has plenty. A POS with stock control should track ingredients at each location, take them off as dishes sell, and warn you when something is running low. Recipes with dish costs are worth setting up at this point too, because a price rise from a supplier now affects margins at both shops.
Reports that compare the sites
The questions change once there are two venues. You want to know which site is busier at which hours, which dishes sell at one and not the other, and whether the new shop is paying its way. Look for reports that show:
- Each site on its own and all sites together.
- Sales by hour, so you can staff each shop for its own busy times.
- An export to your accounting software, so your bookkeeper isn't adding up two sets of figures.
Questions to ask before you open site two
- Can I run both sites from one account and one menu?
- Can I hide items or change prices at one site only?
- Does each site get its own cash-up, kitchen screen and printers?
- Can I limit staff to one site?
- Is stock tracked per site?
- What does each extra venue cost per month?
That last question matters more than it looks. Some providers charge the full price again for every venue; others charge less for each additional site. Work out the cost for the number of sites you expect to have in two years, not just today.
Where Café QR fits
Café QR is a cloud POS with QR ordering built in, and its Multi-site plan is built for this. Menu, branding and staff are shared across your venues, while each location keeps its own tables and QR codes, kitchen screen, printers, cash-up and takings. You can hide an item or set a different price at one location, pause ordering or set separate opening hours per site, and restrict a member of staff to one venue. Stock and recipes are tracked per location, and insights include a by-location table. Delivery zones for online ordering are still shared across venues.
The Multi-site plan is £59 a month for the first venue plus £29 for each extra venue, so two sites cost £88 a month and three cost £117. It includes everything on the POS plan, plus stock and recipes, insights, Xero or QuickBooks export and unlimited staff logins. The first month is free with no card needed. See pricing, the cash-up and reports page, or the restaurant POS page if your second site is a restaurant.