Counter Sales With Fullbay

Hey, shop owners, how are your counter sales doing?

While this topic may seem…elementary…to a lot of you, we realized counter sales (and questions regarding them) came up quite a bit at Diesel Connect. We decided, well, why not elaborate on them? After all, we do try to cover every aspect of shop life.

So we flagged down Fullbay COO Chris O’Brien to tell us more about counter sales, how Fullbay can help with them, and how in turn they can help your business.

WHAT IS A COUNTER SALE?

Counter sales are when you sell a part (or something else, in theory) that doesn’t require labor. You’re basically acting like a store instead of a repair shop.

The feature of the same name is something we built into Fullbay to give a shop the opportunity to sell something fast.

That’s it. That’s the counter sale.

It’s a simplified way to pull parts from your inventory and produce an invoice. “You still get all the attributes that come with Fullbay,” Chris says. “It can go through the Customer Portal.”

It’s a lightning-fast way to set up an invoice.

WHO BENEFITS FROM COUNTER SALES?

A large portion of counter sale customers are actually truckers who need top-offs of coolant or oil. They aren’t going to bring the truck in every time a top-off is necessary, so they’ll buy a couple quarts off you and bring it on the road with them.

Some of the larger shops that use counter sales have actual storefronts attached—as in, anyone can walk in from outside and buy the part they need. Neat, right? If you aren’t selling parts (or even merch like tumblers, coffee mugs, and shop shirts—hey, why not?), counter sales can be a way to build a revenue stream.

We aren’t joking: some of our customers are doing millions in counter sales.

Zoinks!

HOW IS A COUNTER SALE DIFFERENT FROM A SERVICE ORDER?

For the most part, your service order is actually going to include, well, service. For example, your tech will perform an oil change instead of just selling oil to a truck driver for them to use as necessary. If labor is involved, you’re better off using a regular service order or the quick service order, which is useful once you are getting a tech involved but still a faster, leaner invoice overall.

CAN I TIE A COUNTER SALE TO AN ASSET?

Yes. If you’re working with a lot of fleets, you know that they often want each purchase tied to an asset (i.e. a vehicle). Fullbay allows you to do that: you can select a particular unit that the counter sale will connect to. So, the four quarts of oil purchased for a unit can be reflected in the cost-per-unit report.

WHAT ELSE IS COOL ABOUT FULLBAY’S COUNTER SALES?

Let’s say you wander into Aragorn’s Independent Shop and order 10 oil filters. Aragorn has 40 of these filters in stock, but how is his lead tech, Boromir, supposed to know that 10 of those 40 are now essentially spoken for?

It’s simple. Aragorn hits the “Save & Decrement” button, which effectively removes the 10 oil filters from the inventory. The change will reflect across Fullbay; anyone using it will see that there are only 30 oil filters left (hmm, better order some more!).

(Also, automatic inventory updating? I wish my grocery shopping app worked that seamlessly.)

Because counter sales are an easy way to create an invoice, they’re also ideal for someone just getting started with Fullbay. We’ve all been there: you have a newbie, you haven’t set up training yet, but you have to get them to work doing something…hey! Build out counter sales!

HOW HAVE YOU USED COUNTER SALES?

So there you have it: your counter sale invoice is your ticket to selling things and moving on. It’s a revenue-building feature that’s helped shops do better business with truck drivers (and the occasional motorist, if they carry those components!).

Have you used the counter sale feature in Fullbay? Let us know on social media!