Rain POS Review
With multi-store applications, automatic backups, and marketing data, the cloud-based Rain Retail POS system sounds pretty great, right?
Of course, the real question you should be asking yourself is, is this the right POS system for my needs?
We’ve done the hard research so that you don’t have to.
To show you how the Rain Retail point-of-sale system could work for your business, come take a deep dive into some of the system’s best features below.
Where Did Rain Retail POS Come From?
The Rain Retail POS system was developed by a U.S.company of the same name, which was founded back in 2008. Rain retail software was manufactured to bring efficiency to different types of specialty businesses.
Rain retail software runs from a single database, providing owners and managers with equal inventory levels across the variety of sales channels within your business.
The system is 100% cloud-based, meaning you never have to worry about installing powerful servers in-house or backing your data up.
The Rain POS software is very suited to retail businesses and you will hear many retail business owners boasting about its efficiency. This is likely because the software is filled to the brim with tons of retail-specific capabilities and features.
You can even purchase a unique e-commerce website from Rain, which you can integrate with your system in a seamless fashion. Of course, the website is just the cherry on top of the marketing tool, retail management tools, and POS capabilities.
Here are some of the top features that you can expect from your Rain software:
How Much Does Rain POS Cost?
Unfortunately, Rain POS does not have any specific pricing information available on the company website. The cool thing, Rain only asks that users pay a monthly subscription fee to use the service, meaning you don’t need to pay anything upfront.
Another good thing to note is that you can use a demo version of the software for free to see how you like it before you make your ultimate purchase. If you ultimately decide to use the Rain POS system, you will be required to pay $99 per month per user.
That $99 basically gets you one terminal location, though if you need to expand, you must pay more. That is where the pricing becomes a bit more fluid. You will need to contact Rain to find out exactly how much you might be expected to pay for your business.
Hardware
You may have already noticed that Rain does not require any proprietary hardware for you to use the company's point of sale software.
This is like because Rain does not have any hardware components in the lineup anyway.
Some retail store owners or managers may see this as a bit of an inconvenience, though in our opinion, we quite like the fact.
If you think about it, the fact that they don't require any specific hardware allows you to choose whatever components you desire instead!
Do note that Rain does have some affordable, third-party hardware options that can be bundled with the software if you have no idea what hardware to choose. We highly recommend going with POSPortal if you are going to bundle with one of these third-party providers.
In this case, you can choose between the USB Starter Kit, which runs at around $600, or the Ethernet Bundle, which runs around $640.
Top Rain POS Features
Retail is the same as the hospitality business in many ways, as you need a POS solution that is tailored to your day-to-day operations. Thanks to the fact that Rain is packed to the brim with retail-specific features, it has been know to increase sales by up to 20%!
Let’s take a look at some of the software’s best features:
E-Commerce Integration
There are a number of different POS systems that take advantage of integrated e-commerce platforms and Rain is one of them. You must integrate your business website to take full advantage of this integration.
When you do so, the inventory in your online store will automatically update itself whenever you sell or add an item. Your customers will easily be able to find out if you have a certain item in stock before they head over to your store, which can save a ton of time for both parties. Plus, this particular e-commerce integration is very user-friendly on all platforms, making it easy to use on mobile devices as well.
Cloud-Based Software
Cloud-based software solutions are probably the most popular when it comes to POS systems these days. Rain is unique in that it doesn’t require you to constantly backup your data. Rather, Rain backs up all of your data automatically within the cloud. You can then access that data from anywhere in the world with any device as long as you have an Internet connection. Essentially, you don’t physically need to be at your business to see if it is running how it should be.
There are many solutions to cloud-based POS solutions, one of which includes inventory sync. Rain knows exactly how your inventory is moving in and out of your store, providing you with real-time information. Rain has also integrated a service tracking capability, letting you know what items need to be serviced or repaired in real-time.
The system is also completely automated to let you and your customers know about the status of repairs or services so that you don’t have to fuss with manual communication.
Marketing Tools
If you know how to market your business effectively, you can increase your sales. It is simple math. Of course, if you can’t market your business, you may end up losing out on a ton of money.
The Rain POS system provides users with a variety of marketing tools to help increase sales and revenue, including automated coupon emails, automated email marketing, targeted email marketing, an integrated POS website, customer reminders, and social reviews.
Rental Management
One of the big benefits of Rain POS is that it provides users with rental management capabilities. There are a variety of rental management capabilities to make use of, perfect for all types of retail businesses that offer rentals.
You can easily create rental packages and add products to your rental inventory at high speeds. You can pick out the accessories that should be added to specific reservations or bundle items that are typically rented or purchased together.
The rental management system also allows you to create presets for variable rental periods. Customers can rent your products hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, or just about any other rental period you can think of, and each period will get its own unique price. When these prices are integrated in your system, you can accurately calculate checkout totals.
Of course, you’ll likely want to charge more to rent out certain items compared to others. For this, you can customize deposit amounts to help you collect the necessary amount for each specific item. The rental management system also provides users with updated reports on rental items that are going out, have gone out, are coming back in, or are late. You can even determine how you would like to charge customers late fees with preferred period intervals!
Final Verdict - Is Rain POS Worth It?
It is no question that owning or managing a retail business and trying to find ways to increase profitability from sales, loyalty from customers, or overall effectiveness, can be quite difficult. Rain point of sale software makes it so much easier with a number of top-of-the-line features to make use of.
For starters, Rain is a very affordable POS system. It was developed to help retail business owners create more efficiency for their businesses and it does it very well. Secondly, it has a variety of inventory management features and wonderful customer support.
Of course, no POS system comes without downsides. One of the obvious downsides that we noticed with Rain is that you cannot enter multiple inventory items at one time. It is not a deal-breaker by any means, though it is something to note.
In all, if you are looking to find more convenience in your business and increase sales by managing your inventory better, tracking services and repairs, tracking purchase orders, organizing vendors, and managing customer accounts, then Rain POS might just be for you!
Tyler Connaghan
Contributing Author
