Meet Birdsong: one of Charlotte’s original craft breweries, the first brewery in the city to go solar, and a local institution that’s thrived by taking care of its people and saying no to conventional growth and yes to growing sustainably.
Since its launch in 2010, Birdsong has prioritized conscious expansion; after rapidly outgrowing its original location and moving to its current space on N. Davidson, founders Chris and Tara Goulet channeled their energy into building up their community and growing their sustainability initiatives rather than opening multiple spots throughout the city.
Part of that conscious growth? Evolving their technology to align with those sustainable values and to ensure the business has what it needs for continued success amidst an increasingly competitive craft beer landscape.
How it started: Battling with a legacy point of sale system
Birdsong’s been in business for over a decade, which means the tools they launched with are a far cry from what’s on the market now. “We started with a Casio cash register,” Chris Goulet said. “It actually printed the tape, and you had to hit the button and the drawer would spring out. And then we had the weird credit card thing that you had five different wires sticking out of. And the swiper never worked. And you just had to chit-chat with your customer while you were trying to get it to work. And then you’re out of paper,” he explained.
Birdsong spent three years wrestling with that original system, during which time they began using Square at offsite events. It quickly became apparent how easy the platform was to use and how fast it made payments — so they pivoted away from their original system and embraced the full suite of tools Square offers.
“We were like, ‘This seems so easy. I just make a button, and it says Higher Ground IPA, and I don’t have to do anything else,’” Chris Goulet recalled. “And then the button goes to the website, and I can see how many I’ve sold. It was, like, faster than light travels. We were just blown away,” he added.
How it’s going: A faster, smarter business with diversified revenue streams
Embracing the full suite of Square tools has allowed the business to cut their training to about 10 minutes, saving them valuable time and freeing up new staff to do the most important thing: interact with customers. “I feel like normally we spend 10 minutes reviewing it with new bartenders, and they pretty much have it,” Chris Goulet said, adding “You can almost pick it up and ring somebody in without any training,”.
Easy-to-use tools also enable the business to broaden its reach and tap into additional revenue streams like branded merchandise. For Birdsong, having the ability to easily upload and sell merch, cans, and kegs, particularly when those things are limited releases, is one of the most impactful features of its Square Online site.
Chris Goulet remembered being pleasantly surprised when they first launched online ordering. “They’d show up, and I’d be like, ‘You already paid for that, and customers would be like ‘Wow. Okay. Cool,’” he said. In addition to providing Birdsong with another revenue stream, Square Online gave it another way to connect with new customers and ensure existing loyal beer lovers never miss out on a hot new drop.
“A couple of times throughout the year, we have really tight limited releases,” Chris Goulet noted. “Generally people know they can get the four-pack they want or the beer on tap when they come in. But for limited-edition merchandise or kegs, we definitely benefit from online ordering,” he added.
The connection between the point-of-sale and the online site ultimately empowers Birdsong to make smarter business decisions. By leveraging the reporting features available through Square, the business can carry out data-driven decisions and fuel long-term success. In fact, the intelligence features available through Square are what’s kept Birdsong using the system in the face of strong competition.
He recalls an instance where they tested another POS with a great front end but that left much to be desired on the reporting front: “Whoever built the Square reporting actually spent time thinking about, like, ‘What are the five things you want to know right now? Here are the answers.’ And this other system, they were like, ‘What are 10,000 questions you could possibly ask? And here they all are. Try to figure it out.'”
The impact: A satisfied staff able to complete tasks in seconds
But the biggest advantage Square gives Birdsong is adaptability. With a technology partner that can go where they go and take care of everything from payments to performance reports with just a few clicks, the business is well-prepared to take on whatever the always-evolving craft beer industry throws at them.
He reflected on just one instance of what life was like before Square, when technology limitations made Birdsong decidedly un-adaptable. It had its own separate credit card processing terminal and different providers would pay them on different schedules. Some payments would settle in two days, he remembered, while one particular card company would just “pay you whenever they felt like it,” making accounting and reconciliation harder than they needed to be.
But now? “I don’t want to go back to that. Square is really easy because it’s just a list of deposits, and you can be like, ‘This is this sales day,’ and you can verify it very quickly,” he said.
His team, too, benefits from the platform’s flexibility. “The taproom team, they like it because it’s easy for them to adapt. Taproom leads will change stuff if there’s a special, and it takes them, like, 15 seconds. It’s not work, right? And so that is hugely helpful,” he explained.
The Birdsong Brewing team being satisfied with Square is another win for the team after making the switch. With satisfied staff, valuable business data within reach, and new revenue streams, the business is finally able to focus on serving customers and building up the Charlotte community in new and impactful ways.
