2018 Review of Cumulus Retail

From the Sept. 2018 reviews of Point-of-Sale systems.

Cumulus Retail from CAM Commerce is a cloud-based point of sale application that is ideally suited for small to mid-sized niche retail businesses including apparel, footwear, gift and specialty stores, museum shops, and other vertical retail markets. Cumulus is scalable; offering three editions of the application, with mobile apps also available for its point of sale, e-commerce, and inventory modules. Cumulus Retail also offers integration with QuickBooks Online.

Cumulus Retail offers an optional ‘Always On’ add-on application that will allow retailers to continue to process sales transactions even if Internet connectivity disappears. Any transactions processed offline will later post to the main application once online access is restored.

Cumulus Retail includes a Getting Started Wizard which can assist with system setup. The point of sale interface screen is sparsely populated, with users able to add frequently sold products to the Quick Select menu for faster processing. Cashiers can use keywords, descriptions or style to easily search for products directly from the point of sale interface, and can add new products on the fly. Users can choose to process sales by customer, or utilize the cash sale option if desired. Cumulus Retail supports multiple registers at each location, with users able to easily track both sales and inventory levels at any location.

Cumulus Retail accepts a variety of tender types such as cash, checks, both debit and credit cards, along with specialty payments such as Apple Pay, with users able to set up an unlimited number of custom payment methods if desired. Users can easily process multiple transactions from the point of sale interface including product layaway, price checks, product holds, special orders, returns and voids, and even bulk price changes if authorized to do so. Complete sales and order management capability in Cumulus Retail allows users to create and manage individual customer details.

Users can process sales using a variety of methods including entering a product code or scanning the product barcode for quicker processing.

Cumulus Retail offers excellent customer management capability, with CRM functionality included in the product. Users can easily import a customer list from another application, and multiple customer categories can be created to better manage customers. The CRM also allows users to track customer sales data including brick and mortar and online sales totals for better targeted marketing opportunities.

Cumulus Retail offers excellent inventory management, with users able to manage inventory levels for all locations, including online stores. The product also allows users to import products from a vendor catalog, and create product templates to expedite new product entry. Users can be notified when stock levels drop to a specified level, and the product offers easy inventory tracking in real time, with the ability to adjust inventory levels if necessary.

Cumulus Retail offers excellent reporting, with a series of pre-defined reports available for quick access, or users can choose to utilize the Report Designed feature to design custom reports. There are four groups of reports; Sales, Inventory, Customer, and Employee. Sales reports available include Merchandise Sold, Sales versus Returns, and Returns. There are also a wide variety of inventory reports that track product movement and purchase history. Reporting options do vary in each addition of Cumulus Retail.

Cumulus Retail works with all standard point of sale hardware peripherals such as cash drawers, receipt printers, barcode scanners, and monitors. There is also optional integration with a variety of popular shipping products including UPS, FedEx and USPS. Also available is the optional iCumulus e-commerce module, which allows brick and mortar customers to easily integrate their e-commerce store into their regular operation. The e-Commerce module is available in two versions, and also offers professional design and layout options for creating a strong web presence. The premier version of E-Commerce also offers integration with both Amazon and Amazon Fulfillment as well as Walmart Marketplace and eBay.

A Getting Started wizard is included in all versions of Cumulus Retail for easier system setup. The Standard version of the application offers chat and email support, while the other three versions offer telephone support as well. Support is available during regular business hours, with weekend support available as well. Product users also have access to additional resources through the customer portal, including product brochures and training videos.

A great point of sale solution for small to mid-sized retail businesses, Cumulus Retail is available in three editions. The standard version, which is designed for a single user per store and costs $75. The Advanced version is $125, and the Premier version is $199, with both the Advanced and the Premier versions designed for three users per store, though additional users can be added. The iCumulus eCommerce application is available in two versions, with the advanced version running $129 per month.

2018 Rating – 5 Stars