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Education

Tapping into the health POS solutions. The survey focused on small merchants
with revenue under $250,000 to medium-sized with
and beauty vertical revenue up to $100 million.
The size and potential of the health and beauty segments
should have acquirers and ISOs salivating. No doubt a huge
chunk of the revenue flowing through these establishments
results from credit and debit card transactions. That's the
perfect entrée for introducing smart POS solutions. Many
of these business owners are no doubt frustrated at the
costs they attribute to their traditional, single-purpose
payment terminals.

Changing nature of POS
Smart POS solutions can transform the traditional point of
sale into a new point of interaction, or POI, with the mer-
chant countertop becoming a flexible, adaptable interface
By Nicky Koopman between consumers, acquirers, applications and services
AEVI providers.

.S. consumers purchased $8 billion worth of Smart POS solutions based on open hardware provide ac-
makeup products in 2018, according to data cess to a marketplace of apps that ensure merchants can
published by The NPD Group. The average easily innovate. Acquirers, ISOs and merchant level sales-
U hair salon generates sales of $245,000, adding people (MLSs) should be rushing to provide merchants
up to $63 billion nationwide, stated TheSalonBusiness. in these segments with a platform capable of doing much
com. Add in licensed and unlicensed health practitioners more than payment and helping them to increase produc-
and service providers, and you're looking at a multibillion tivity and profitability.
dollar, primarily small business retail market that is eager
for innovative payment solutions. The PYMNTS survey found that 80 percent of those sur-
veyed said they were interested in innovating with con-
Merchants in the health and beauty products and services sumer-facing apps that can offer solutions such as digital
segments seek to improve payment acceptance and create receipts, customer satisfaction rankings, loyalty programs
new customer-facing features, according to a recent survey and different payment acceptance methods. They're eager
of more than 600 companies conducted by PYMNTS in to use smart POS systems to manage marketing and loy-
collaboration with AEVI. alty programs. They're also coming to grips with consum-
er expectations of using their mobile devices to interface
There's an estimated 322,434 beauty shops, including with merchants in-store and online.
hairdressers, barbers, facial salons, manicure and pedicure
salons, and other similar businesses, according to siccode. Let's start with the core POS functions, which today pri-
com. Clinics and offices of licensed and unlicensed health marily involve card transaction processing and simple
practitioners number 410,678. Then there are 47,891 health receipt printing. Every business should have the opportu-
and allied services establishments such as health screening nity to provide customers with a choice of printed or elec-
and hearing testing services, among others. Others, such tronic receipts. Consumers should be able to order online
as cosmetics stores and orthopedics establishments, fall and in-store, with the merchant benefiting from insights
into a miscellaneous retail category. into previous purchases. Tip management and tax report-
ing today is a nightmare. Credit and debit card transaction
A million opportunities reports are completely separate from cash management.

All told, we're probably looking at a potential merchant Apps for every business need
base close to, if not exceeding 1 million locations. Many of
these businesses are ripe for all-in-one smart POS solutions Smart POS systems can help relieve those issues and do
that accommodate payment acceptance with customer- so much more. Workforce time and attendance, inventory
facing and business apps all integrated into an easy to management, appointment scheduling, deliveries, promo-
use platform that even the youngest, least experienced tions and loyalty program management, customized re-
employee can operate. ceipts, document scanning and storage, bar code scanning
and self-checkout – the list of crucial business functions
More than 60 percent of respondents in the PYMNTS goes on and on, and there are smart app developers work-
survey indicated they are very ready for innovation, and ing to implement the software for smart POS solutions.
44 percent indicated they are very interested in new smart The next generation of acquiring will center on providing
merchants with a suite of tailored apps that complement
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