Retail

A retail shop needs two things working together: a customer who can walk in, get what they need, and pay quickly, and an owner who still knows at the end of the day what sold, what’s owed, and what’s left on the shelf. A cashier ringing up a regular doesn’t think about “Catalog” or “Inventory” — they think about whether the price on screen is right and whether there’s stock to hand over. Getting there means a few things have to be true before the till opens: products exist and are priced the way you actually price them, stock has actually arrived (not just been ordered), and the people you extend credit or loyalty to are on file.

This guide follows that order — stock and price the shop, let people buy, then close out knowing your cash and your numbers agree. Some days that’s the whole story; other days a customer runs a tab, wants a quote, or takes goods on credit, and this guide covers those too. Each step links to a guide with the full mechanics — treat this page as the overview, not the full reference.

1. Set up your branch

Every sale, shift, and report is tied to a branch, so this comes first. Create it as a retail profile, or retail + restaurant if the same counter also serves food — the two can share a branch and catalog; pharmacy never does. A new branch gets a default terminal automatically.

→ Setup, registers & shifts

2. Build your catalog

Add products through the item wizard — name, unit, tax, and price. Pick whichever entry mode (Inclusive or Exclusive) matches how your price tags are actually written; MerchMind keeps the ex-tax figure, the tax-inclusive figure, and your profit % in sync from there, so you only ever have to enter one of them.

→ Products & item types · Item pricing modes

If different customers should pay different prices — a wholesale account, staff, a loyalty tier — set up named price lists now. You’ll attach them to customer groups in step 4, and the register resolves the right price automatically from then on.

→ Selling price groups

Creating an item here doesn’t put anything on the shelf — it only defines what the product is. Quantity is a separate fact that Inventory has to establish, which is the next step.

→ Catalog vs stock

3. Bring in stock

Add your suppliers, then receive stock against them. A purchase only affects on-hand quantity once its status is received — a pending or ordered purchase is still just paperwork, so reported stock never gets ahead of what’s actually on the shelf.

→ Suppliers · Purchases & receiving

Going live with stock you already have, rather than a fresh delivery? Load it as opening stock, not a purchase. Later, stock adjustments cover the losses a purchase or sale can’t explain — breakage, theft, a cycle count that came up short.

→ Opening stock & purchase returns · Stock adjustments

4. Add your customers

Loyalty, credit, and the pricing from step 2 all depend on the customer being on file first. Register customers under Contacts, and assign a customer group to anyone who should get automatic pricing instead of the shelf price.

→ Contacts · Customer groups

5. Open the register and sell

Open a session and shift with a cash float, then sell: scan or search items, attach a customer when pricing or loyalty applies, apply a promo code when the cart qualifies.

→ Setup, registers & shifts · Promotions & loyalty

Take payment in cash or M-Pesa, in whichever shape your branch is configured for — STK push, Paybill/Till, a manually entered confirmation, or QR.

→ Payments

Not every cart ends in cash changing hands right away. A regular running a tab, a customer who wants a price in writing, or someone taking goods now and paying later are all normal — MerchMind treats them as distinct states, not workarounds.

→ Held, quotations & credit

6. Handle the after-sale

Customers bringing goods back go through Returns — held pending until a supervisor PIN approves it, or auto-approved depending on how you’ve set that up. If what they bought was a serialized item with a warranty, that entitlement started on the day of sale and can be looked up later by serial, receipt, or phone.

→ Returns & under-pick · Warranties

7. Close out and review

Count cash to close the shift — expected cash is the opening float plus cash sales, minus till expenses and cash refunds. Record spend as it happens rather than reconstructing it later, and check the reports for the rest: what sold, what’s owed, what’s left in stock.

→ Expenses & cashbook · Reports

Running more than one vertical

• Pharmacy — always its own branch, never mixed in
• Restaurant — can share a branch and catalog with retail (ready dishes sell from the retail cart, retail stockables like drinks sell from the floor)