Anyone selling cigars knows that success hinges on more than just great tobacco.
Between balancing your inventory with classic smokes and exciting new finds to staying compliant with strict tobacco sale regulations, owning a cigar shop presents hurdles that most general retailers simply don’t face.
That’s why a generic point of sale (POS) system just won’t cut it. You need something built for the tobacco industry — a cigar shop POS that helps you track inventory, deliver great service, and make your daily grind a lot easier.
If you’re looking for a cigar shop POS to handle these unique demands, here are four features to keep top of mind, plus some of the leading industry providers.
1. Cigar Inventory Management
Customers come to you knowing they’ll find their preferred cigars, and maybe something new to catch their eye, stocked on your shelves.
But managing hundreds (if not thousands) of cigars isn’t easy without the right tools. Luckily, a cigar shop POS has a few features tailored to help you take control of your inventory.
Carton-pack inventory management is particularly useful for cigar shops, allowing you to track your stock at both the carton and individual unit levels for an easily digestible overview of everything you have on hand. Case breaking is another helpful feature that lets you sell an entire carton or an individual unit, depending on your customers’ preferences.
Related Read: Mastering Smoke Shop Inventory Management: 6 Tips & Tools
These specialized features give your customers the flexibility to try a single cigar or purchase an entire carton, while also making it easier for you to manage inventory.
2. Cigar Label Printing
Cigars typically arrive at your shop in bulk cartons. However, when a customer wants to purchase just one or a few, your team must manually enter prices, increasing the likelihood of pricing errors or inventory discrepancies.
That’s why your cigar shop POS should include individual barcode label printing — this way, you can print and apply labels to each cigar for more transparent pricing. Your team can simply scan each cigar at checkout, making the process quick and straightforward.
This not only maintains accurate pricing and inventory, but gives you valuable data on vendor performance and profit margins, leading to more informed restocking choices.
3. Age Verification
Tobacco sales are subject to strict regulations, so you must make sure any and all customers are of legal smoking age before completing a transaction.
One cigar shop POS feature addresses this directly: built-in age verification. With age verification prompts, your staff must manually enter a customer’s date of birth before a sale can proceed.
Related Read: Tobacco Store Employee Permissions: Set Your POS Up the Right Way
For quick, accurate transactions, many cigar shop POS systems include ID scanning hardware, which lets your employees simply scan a customer’s ID to confirm they’re legally permitted to buy tobacco (e.g. 21 years old in the U.S.).
Automatic prompts and ID scanning make it easy for everyone on your team, even newer staff, to follow the same protocols. This built-in verification gives store owners peace of mind that their store won’t face any potential penalties and fines from underage sales.
4. Tobacco Scan Data Reporting
Beyond ringing up sales, a cigar shop POS system should generate tobacco scan data reports showing your top-selling items over a specified time period.
This feature helps cigar shop owners in two main ways:
- Know what sells (and what doesn’t): Tobacco scan data shows customer shopping habits, identifying your best and worst sellers and helping you make better inventory decisions.
- Scan data incentives: Many tobacco manufacturers offer incentives for sharing your sales insights. By participating, you can often access discounts for your customers and earn valuable rebates for your business.
Related Read: Tobacco Scan Data Incentive Program Basics
When selecting a POS system for your cigar shop, choose one that offers easy-to-access tobacco scan data reports.
Top Cigar Shop POS Providers
Now that you know what features to look for, let’s look at some of the leading POS providers currently available for cigar shops, so you can find the best one for your business.
4. Square
Square POS is a user-friendly system with payment processing, inventory tracking, and basic customer management. Square also offers age restriction features, including ID scanning on higher-tier plans, which is crucial for tobacco shops.
- Advantages: It offers a user-friendly interface, includes inventory management tools, and provides age verification features with its Retail plans.
- Considerations: Access to advanced features like barcode label printing and specialized reporting requires their higher-tier Retail plans.
Overall, Square is a solid option for newer shops, but you’ll need to assess if it fully meets your specific cigar inventory and reporting needs.
3. KORONA POS
Designed for high-volume retail, KORONA POS includes several helpful inventory management and compliance features. Its age verification and individual cigar tracking capabilities can help you and your team handle strict regulations and maintain control over your varied stock.
- Advantages: It provides granular inventory management, includes age verification features, and offers specialized reporting capabilities.
- Considerations: It has limited integrations and may present a steeper learning curve compared to other cigar shop POS platforms.
KORONA POS is a strong contender for established or growing cigar shops that need advanced inventory control and built-in compliance tools, but might not be the most user-friendly interface.
2. Lightspeed
Lightspeed offers a sophisticated retail POS platform with strong inventory management, reporting, and customer relationship tools. While not exclusive to tobacco, several features can help cigar shop owners, including item categorization and age verification.
- Advantages: It features strong inventory management, detailed reporting, integrated e-commerce options, and extensive third-party app integrations for customer management.
- Considerations: Its cost can be higher than other POS systems, and it utilizes preset credit card processing rates that may not be ideal for high-risk transactions.
Lightspeed is a powerful option for cigar shops needing advanced inventory and multichannel capabilities, but carefully evaluate its support for individual labeling and specialized tobacco reporting against your specific needs.
1. Cigars POS
If you’re looking for a POS system built specifically for cigar shops, look no further than Cigars POS. This specialized platform includes inventory management for both boxes and individual cigars, built-in label printing for single sticks, strong age verification with ID scanning, specialized reports for tobacco sales, and more.
- Advantages: It offers cigar-specific inventory management, integrated barcode label printing, ID scanners for age verification, built-in customer loyalty programs, and detailed scan data reporting.
- Considerations: As a cloud-based system, it may initially raise staff training or technology concerns, but 24/7 support and a highly responsive team can address any issues.
Overall, Cigars POS is one of the best options for cigar shops needing a system that directly handles all the complexities of tobacco inventory, labeling, compliance, and reporting.
Smoke the Competition With a Cigar Shop POS
If you’re tired of a generic POS, a specialized system can provide the solutions your cigar shop needs.
With features like inventory management tailored for tobacco, integrated cigar label printing, reliable age verification, and insightful reporting, a cigar shop POS is the key to more organized operations and a better bottom line.
Ready to see a POS system built with your cigar shop in mind? Give Cigars POS a try!
Schedule a free, personalized demo with one of our industry experts to see how Cigars POS can make a real difference in your day-to-day.
