I have been working with Square for about 9 months now. As a computer professional, I offer this insight for new users to Square.
1. If you plan on having more than 40 or more inventory items to manage. Pick another application method.
Justification for Statement
I personally have a business with over 400 line items in my inventory. Items with a lot of turn-over. Items where the images for my products change because of the method (s) I use to make them. i.e. different color stain, different color wood, or just change the whole item visually.
This necessitates the changing of the images associated with the products. The description of the products, The pricing of products. Sometimes even the category an item may belong. So you're reading this and saying ... well just create a new item in the library and move on. And while that may be a down and dirty simple solution on the surface of the issue. The problem begins to creep in when trying to sell your product at a trade show. Searching through 100's of dead inventory line items to find the right one. Not to mention the negative impact on the Square database network for managing the inventory in the first place.
And just for the newly initiated to Square Item Library. Let's talk about item entry into the Library.
Step 1. Take a picture or acquire a picture of the item you plan to sell. Now keep in mind that the JPEG or PNG image cannot exceed an oddball size of 720 px X 720 px. (This is according to Square). If you try doing something greater it gets truncated or askew. Take notice also of the method the image was produced. If using an IPAD - Orientation matters! If you don't. Every image in the library could be upside down!!
So you've taken your 100+ pictures massaged them, and renamed them in such a way you can identify and are ready to add items to the library.
2. But wait. You say I can't add any images except through the Item Library management area of the Square application, Well so much for doing just a simple import of all the information needed for each of the 100 line items. Even if you import all the textual data needed. You still have to go to Square Item Library and manually import each individual image to the related item.
Ok. So by now, you're saying well why bother with images in the first place. Simple question begets simple answer. Try to sell something online that a potential customer can't see!
WooCommerce in WordPress is expecting an image with the products being sync'd with Square. If there isn't one in the Item Library. A blank space holder icon is presented on the WordPress Products web page for each item. So you can either turn off product images in WooCommerce on your website (Not recommended if you plan to sell anything besides a service) or have WooCommerce put a static image icon of your choice in all the blank product image fields. Makes it kind of hard to sell a product your customer can't see. A clock for example or how about 50 different clocks.
The point to all this is that Square is suitable for a limited application. This is especially true if you have rapidly changing line items that require image updates.
This application is suited to businesses that do NOT make large numbers of their own products with changing visual representation requirements.
Financial reporting is great. The transaction processing is great (better than PayPal for a number of reasons).
POS for static/limited line items - Absolutely.
I also own a bookstore business. This application is absolutely not recommended for that kind of business enterprise. NO CUSTOM FIELDS ARE AVAILABLE IN THE ITEM LIBRARY! So if you're expecting to be able to add your own fields to their database. Forget it.
Just my dollars worth.
