Aloha Considerations for Programming & Menu Setup
This is a guide to programming categories and items within Aloha to provide the best insights via Avero reporting. To read more about Aloha and Avero visit: Aloha POS
Updating Aloha Programming or Programming a New Aloha System
Different POS systems require some degree of configuration for the data to display correctly in Avero and be analyzed effectively. An understanding of your POS categories and how Avero handles your categories is needed to make changes. Avero provides the following Global categories: Beverage, Food, Misc., Other, and Retail. The major and minor categories come from your POS. When pulling the data from Aloha, there is only one category level—this is unique to Aloha.
Categories are an essential element when viewing Avero reports - this is how to apply the business intelligence that Avero provides to your operation. Categories with enough detail enable you to analyze your operation from a financial viewpoint and also better evaluate server performance. Category mapping decisions should be made with input from the chef, the FOH, and the accounting teams so all needs are met.
Sales & Reporting Categories in Aloha
In Aloha, it is important to distinguish between Sales and Reporting categories. Categories must be set up as Sales Categories in order for you to gain the most insights from Avero reports. This is an important point to make when discussing your category setup with your Aloha reseller or programmer. Only items in Sales Categories will translate into revenue in Avero.
Creating Categories in Aloha
Your Aloha reseller has experience with creating new sales categories for a new installation. The categories are guided by your requests. Understanding how your categories will show up in Avero will help you direct your POS reseller to create your categories. See our examples below.
Modifiers – Zero Dollar ($0) or Add-on Sales ($)
In Aloha, modifiers are treated like items and may or may not have a dollar value attached to them. We recommend that you create an additional category called ‘Modifiers.’ By putting these in one auxiliary category, the percentage of category sales metric will not be skewed. This also allows the opportunity to report specifically on the success of upsell campaigns focused on add-ons, such as adding fixings to a burger or sides to a lunch order.
Remapping Current Items to New Categories
When creating new categories in an existing Aloha installation, we recommend creating one category at a time and then moving all appropriate items into the new category that you just created. For instance, if you are working with what is currently ‘Food’ in Aloha, you should:
- Create the new ‘Apps’ sales category
- Move all Appetizer items from ‘Food’ into the new ‘Apps’ category
- Move on to the next category
This will eliminate confusion and expedite the process.
Please note: DO NOT reuse old sales category names; always create a new category. Additionally, the new categories will take effect in Avero from the date you move the items forward. The changes will not show in the product prior to that date; the sooner you can get it done, the better.
Recommended Categories
Below are the common categories we see and how they roll into Avero's Global Categories, which are above the POS Categories. These sub-categories may come directly from your printed menu.
Under Avero’s Global Food Category:
- Appetizers (including specials, prix fixed items, banquet items, salads, soups)
- Entrees (including specials, prix fixed items, banquet items)
- Sides
- Desserts
- Dollar Food Modifiers – Add-on sales
Under Avero’s Global Beverage Category:
- Beer
- Liquor
- Wine Bottle
- Wine Glass
- Specialty Cocktails (including all margaritas, sangrias, sake)
- N/A Beverages (*may be considered as a food category)
- Coffee/Espresso
- Dollar Bev Modifiers – Add-on sales (up charge)
Under Avero’s Global Misc. Category:
- Zero Dollar Bev Modifiers (rocks, no salt)
- Zero Dollar Food Modifiers (allergy, fire, seat #)
Examples of how menu organization may impact reporting:
Recommended Revenue Centers
Revenue centers in Aloha can be set up by Table, Terminal, and Order Mode and exist in a hierarchy allowing some settings to override others. In Aloha's hierarchy, Terminal overrides Table, and Order Mode overrides terminal.
The location of the terminal can designate the revenue center. For example, the terminal behind the bar is the Bar Revenue Center. To view Banquets as a separate revenue center in Avero, we recommend that you dedicate a separate terminal to enter banquet sales. This separate revenue center will appear in Avero reports and can be included or excluded when looking at your data. Your Aloha reseller can give you a more complete explanation.
This is the preferred solution, rather than using a unique server job code or table number for banquets. You do not have the ability to include or exclude a server or table number from the report generator when looking at sales reports, as you do with a separate revenue center.
If shared terminals must be used, make sure to have appropriate Order Modes in place and service standards that ensure employees are applying the correct Order Mode when entering orders at a shared terminal. Example: if Banquets needs to use the Bar Terminal (which routes to Bar Revenue Center) to ring revenue which should be routed to Banquets, applying a 'Banquets' Order Mode would override the terminal. This is not ideal, because human error is likely and mistakes happen.