Intro

Arcview Market Research and its research partner BDS Analytics suggest that spending on legal cannabis worldwide is expected to hit $57 billion by 2027. 

As more states and countries legalize recreational and medical marijuana, cannabis cultivators, processors, distributors, and retailers are realizing that they will need software to increase their visibility and production flow.

Software can help maintain compliance, manage the complexities of unique operations, optimize processes, and manage every aspect of business with one solution.

Here, we will go through some must-have software to help you thrive and flourish in the cannabis industry, whether these tools are for a point of sale system (POS), an All-in-one ERP system, or workforce management solution. These types of programs can help turn your business into a true industry heavyweight.

What is Point of Sales Software?

When it comes to maintaining a fluid and profitable cannabis retail operation, choosing top-notch POS software is of the utmost importance. Compliancy, inventory control, and integrations mean most dispensaries opt for a POS designed specifically for the cannabis industry.

While looking for compliance, here are a few additional features and services you should make sure your POS software has for a more seamless implementation process which can lead to an increase in your sales per hour:

• Design and usability
• Control and clarity
• Flexibility and cooperation
• Support and response time
• Cost and scale

Here are a few Retail POS systems to consider:

IndicaOnline  

All-in-one cloud-based dispensary POS system IndicaOnline is packed with innovative and beneficial capabilities. Among other things, it will help you process transactions and manage daily operations for medical marijuana businesses and dispensaries.

You will come to like some of the industry-specific features, including: 

• patient and physician verification
• inventory tracking
• customer management
• an offline mode
• and automated state reporting

The solution also allows for integration with critical third-party services for enhanced versatility. Such aspects make IndicaOnline one of the best marijuana dispensary POS systems in the market.

COVA

Through the COVA POS interface, you can access information like:

• pricing
• product descriptions
• promotional information
• available stock
• identify popular items 
• and track customer loyalty. 

Another excellent feature from Cova Dispensary is the offline feature. That allows you to access your POS system at any time, from anywhere, and from most devices. This way you don't need to worry about a customer paying for their product if your Internet is down.

BioTrackTHC  

For the past decade, BioTrack THC has worked with hundreds of different dispensary owners and dispensaries to understand the cannabis business.

Once in the POS system, you can easily customize:

• inventory
• system workflows
• Permissions
• and much more.

Being able to meet the ever-changing needs of your cannabis business is so essential in today’s rapidly evolving landscape. 

BioTrack THC is also unique because they also provide services for various government entities, giving you an advantage as a dispensary owner comes to technical and legal implications. This system helps ensure that employees and customers follow every state regulation.

What is ERP Software?

ERP software exists in every market that cannabis has been legalized medicinally and recreationally. From dispensaries, brands with products, growers, etc. Seed-to-sale tracking is extremely important and ERP software makes this type of data accessible and easy to navigate.

Utilizing an all-in-one ERP software that's accurately accounting for every plant throughout the entire cultivation, extraction, and packaging process (from seed-to-sale) is mission-critical.

Efficiently accounting for every plant clone, crop, batch, and SKU in your supply chain is a massive endeavor, and inventory management solutions come in all shapes and sizes. Many include a range of additional features, striving to be a full-suite solution for your canna-business. 

Like many software tools, your ERP software should be largely focused on efficiency to save time and money. 

Here are some ERP suggestions we recommend:

Microsoft Dynamics 365

Dynamics 365 Business Central and Finance & Operations are Microsoft's modular-based ERP solutions that can be deployed both on the cloud as a SaaS solution or on-premises and can be specifically built for the cannabis industry. Dynamics 365 allows you to integrate data and processes across multiple departments and locations. Allows you to produce, move and track cannabis products from seed-to-sale. 

Dynamics 365 can accommodate businesses from every operation size, small, medium, to enterprise: retailers, startups, and multi-million-dollar companies. Lastly, being a Microsoft solution, Dynamics 365 will allow you seamless integration with your Office 365 products (i.e., Outlook, Word, Excel). 

We have an internal team of Microsoft Dynamics 365 experts if you have any questions.

Viridian Sciences

Viridian Sciences business management software solution for the cannabis industry replacing the need for multiple single-purpose Software, having your entire business managed in one place. Saving your business time and money in such a critical juncture of the cannabis industry

This cannabis ERP software is for those who seek to gain a significant competitive advantage in the market, need compliance, security and want to be on the cutting-edge of software technology.

NexTec

The food and agriculture experts at NexTec have partnered with leading Cannabis industry experts to develop a cannabis ERP software called CannaBusiness ERP that lets you run your Cannabis business as a business should be run. 

CannaBusiness ERP is a powerful solution that not only handles tracking of seed-to-sale activities but encompasses your entire cannabis operations. With add-ons that allow for more enhancements to the Sage Business Cloud product, including grow operations and optimization management, production scheduling, product forecasting, and quality control.

What is Workforce Management Software?

No business can afford unsatisfied employees who are representing the business and the brand. You need an engaged group of ambitious individuals with a thirst for product knowledge and a passion for what they do.

Building that culture starts with communication and creating that platform to collaborate, share knowledge and ideas internally. As a business, you need a secure and reliable infrastructure to engage with your team.

We recommend Microsoft 365s' Teams platform to start building that culture digitially:

Microsoft Teams

Teams is a collaboration app that can come part of Microsoft's 365 packages (formally Office 365). With teams, you can collaborate internally, create work tasks, store data and important documents through SharePoint. 

Being a cloud-based application, you can access Teams on-the-go and use the product for virtual meetings internally, externally and use Teams as your Cloud-Based phone system (VOIP).

Microsoft 365 also can also come with the following:

• Outlook/Exchange
• OneDrive
• Word
• Excel
• PowerPoint
• SharePoint
• And more

Microsoft 365, coming with so many features, is a great foundation to build on. Please let us know if you've seen any other Workforce Management Software as good and also reach out if you have any questions regarding any Microsoft products. 

Conclusion 

Selecting the right Software for your cannabis business or business, in general, is not only a hard task, but critical to the overall success of your business. From cultivators to retailers and everything in between, the right software replaces clusters of standalone systems and instantly drives efficiency, increasing productivity, and reduces manual processes. 

We have an internal team available to help guide your software search, so don't hesitate to get in touch with our team today! Shoot us a quick email: business@plantedwealth.com