When it comes to giving the best experience to its customers, Carmen’s Best has been taking leaps and bounds to make patrons get more than just a scoop of their ice cream.
Since it first started putting a smile to their customer’s faces through their fun and intriguing flavors in 2011, the homegrown ice cream brand has become a favorite for many. Carmen’s Best has also since distributed their products, made only of fresh milk from their own dairy farm, to over 200 outlets, including airlines (PAL, Delta, and Qantas), coffee shops, grocery stores. It also exports to Singapore.
Aside from distributing to these outlets, Carmen’s Best also opened a kiosk at Alabang Town Center in Muntinlupa. For owner Francisco “Paco” Magsaysay, this physical store made him realize that there are still many patrons who do not know their product.
“When we first opened our store in Alabang, we found out that there are still a lot of people, who have never tried Carmen’s Best,” said Magsaysay. “So, I said that we need more stores and embark on retail business.”
Last year, Carmen’s Best unveiled its first ice cream parlor in Power Plant Mall in Rockwell, Makati City. According to Paco, this sit-down store, with a counter that looks like a traditional ice-cream cart, was not originally part of their plan.
But when a space opened in the new wing of the said mall, he knew that it was the chance for them to reach out to more customers and let them have more than just single-serve cups of their ice cream. They also serve their products in homemade cones.
“I want to let as many people taste our products so, we consider this store as our showroom where everyone can try our ice creams flavors,” said Magsaysay. “But of course, running a retail store is different from business-to-business selling of products.”
As a hands-on businessman, Magsaysay knew that they need to integrate digital tools to boost the operations of their store, especially with the increasing number of patrons lining up every day to get their ice cream.
Carmen’s Best chose business solutions integrator Genie Technologies Inc. to roll out out a new point of sale system that can help the gourmet ice cream brand not just boost its operations but also deliver the best service to customers.
“When we opened our store in Power Plant Mall, we did not anticipate the volume of people who would buy our ice cream and, our previous POS system could not keep up with the volume of customers,” said Magsaysay. “So, I decided to look for a new one that can give us the flexibility we need to adhere to the larger volume of customers.”
The project aims to upgrade Carmen’s POS by integrating NCR Aloha POS into their current systems. This solution gives the ice cream parlor the tools it needs to boost sales and increase the pace and accuracy of service. It also eases taking of orders and payments, food preparation, keeping track of inventory, as well as the overall flow of store operations.
NCR Aloha POS is also ideal for quick service and fast casual sit-down stores and can be used on fixed POS terminals, built-for-purpose handheld devices and consumer mobile devices.
The POS system can even make for a more engaging experience as it enables customers to see the details of their purchase of transaction through a monitor facing them.
“Working with GenieTech has helped us boost our efficiency, especially since they helped us tailor-fit the POS System to how we want it to work,” said Magsaysay.
Mahesh Gopinath, the chief operating officer of GenieTech, said that “our team is more than excited for this project. From our end, we look forward to supporting Carmen’s Best’s vision of putting a smile on everyone’s face.”
