saltmotion and BrighterShop Au

In June 2010, saltmotion Gallery & Café opened at Market Place Manly, with BrighterShop Au their chosen software

"BrighterShop is a very powerful business tool that gives us hands on understanding, at any given moment, of how our business is tracking."

In 2007, respected photographer Joel Coleman started saltmotion, initially as a website where anyone could view Joel's photos from around the beaches. The site grew – and eventually became a weekly update of photographs with a wrap-up of surf events and conditions. It became an on-line gallery where Joel could sell his photographs and limited edition prints.

"It was not long after this that we began discussing a permanent place to display and sell the photographs," explained Joel. "We really wanted to create a space where people could come and appreciate art, but also stay a while, relax and enjoy each other’s company."

In partnership with Marc Desveaux and Sep Ashakni – who had shared with Joel their dream opening a café which also sold designed t-shirts – Joel planned a unique venue with a good vibe, lots of creative energy and first class coffee and cakes. Just before Christmas 2009 they found the perfect location in Manly and after the mammoth task of refurbishing the space, saltmotion Gallery & Café opened in June 2010.

Finding the Right POS Solution

The evaluation of the software to manage sales for the gallery was a collaboration between Joel and his partner Sherrie Daley. They knew that they had unique requirements and that the solution would need to be flexible enough to accommodate these requirements and that it may also need custom functionality.

"Initially I was nervous about committing our business to a point of sale system that I wasn't familiar with" explained Sherrie. "It was a big decision for us given the intricacies of our specific business and the way in which we manage sales, ordering as well as managing the limited edition art pieces."

Their initial testing using the trial version of BrighterShop allowed them to develop a workflow to suit their specific business model. saltmotion sells customer's selected prints in the desired size with their preferred frame type. They had to track each of the components of the sale and manage ordering and reporting for costs.

The BrighterShop Au Bill of Materials feature allowed them to build items from the required components and present the finished product to the customer at point of sale. As the distributor of BrighterShop Au, Ambrite provided guidance and on-line demonstrations to assist in the best implementation to suit their business model.

"Ambrite exceeded our expectations with the customer service they provided in helping us to understand and set up BrighterShop for our gallery," stated Sherrie. "BrighterShop is a very powerful business tool that gives us hands on understanding, at any given moment, of how our business is tracking."

Unique Requirements and Custom Module

One particular requirement was to track the sales of their limited edition prints. It was critical to know how many had been sold so that sales would not exceed the limit set for the print. Although BrighterShop can produce detailed reports and can simply export sales data so that the sales could be analysed using an external application such as Excel, Ambrite was able to develop an additional module that integrates with BrighterShop to report on this information without having to leave the application.

Sherrie sums up by explaining, "The additional features that we requested were built and delivered with speed and ease. Overall I am thoroughly impressed and ever grateful to Ambrite for working with us and helping us to set up BrighterShop. Our gallery runs smoothly as a result - and looks super impressive that we can use BrighterShop on a Mac - perfect!"

Joel extends an invitation to all. "Come down and visit us at saltmotion. After all it is the people that really make the place come to life."

About BrighterShop Au

BrighterShop Au is the result of a two-year development collaboration between US-based developer Rob Costin of BrighterData and Mark Richards of Ambrite Pty Ltd to customise the BrighterShop retail point of sale software system for Australian retail regulatory and market conditions. Any retail business that purchases or consigns and tracks stock and makes sales to customers at one or more checkouts can utilise BrighterShop Au. BrighterShop runs on any Mac or Windows computer with FileMaker 10 or 11 installed.

Customers can download a full-featured trial of the software at no charge from www.brightershop.com.

   Ambrite Pty Ltd • abn 31 068723124 • PO box 286 Waverley NSW 2024 Australia • phone: +61 (0)2 9386 9368