☕ Café owner from Chicago - Escaping QuickBooks subscription hell

General
1

Hello Beancount friends! I’m Elena, owner of two coffee shops in Chicago.

How I Found Plain Text Accounting

After paying $89/month for QuickBooks Online for 5 years (that’s $5,340!), dealing with constant upsells, and getting locked out during a ‘sync error’ right before payroll, I knew there had to be a better way.

My nephew (computer science student) suggested looking into ‘plain text accounting’ and here I am!

My Business Background

  • Opened first café in 2018
  • Expanded to second location in 2021
  • 12 employees across both locations
  • Daily cash transactions, inventory, payroll
  • Multiple vendor accounts, equipment leases

Current Transition (Month 2)

Slowly moving from QuickBooks to Beancount:

  • Imported 2024 data as a starting point
  • Tracking daily sales and cash reconciliation
  • Managing vendor invoices and payments
  • Learning to handle inventory in Beancount
  • Still using QB for payroll (for now)

Challenges I’m Facing

  • Cash register integration
  • Tip pooling and distribution tracking
  • Inventory management (coffee beans, pastries)
  • Sales tax reporting
  • Multiple location consolidation

What Excites Me About PTA

  • No subscription fees: That $89/month can buy a lot of coffee beans
  • Data ownership: MY data on MY computer
  • Customization: Can build exactly what my cafés need
  • Transparency: I can see exactly how calculations work

Questions for the Community

  • Anyone tracking retail/restaurant operations?
  • Best practices for cash businesses?
  • How to handle perishable inventory?
  • POS system integration ideas?

Ready to reclaim control of my financial data! Also, if anyone’s in Chicago, first cortado is on me! :hot_beverage:

Elena | Brewing better books, one transaction at a time

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Elena, welcome to freedom from QuickBooks prison! :tada: As a tax specialist who’s helped many small businesses transition, you’re making a smart move. For cash businesses, daily reconciliation is key. Create an Assets:Cash:Register account for each location and reconcile daily. For inventory, I use a perpetual inventory system with Expenses:COGS:Coffee and Assets:Inventory:Coffee accounts. Sales tax is actually easier in Beancount - just track Liabilities:SalesTax:IL. Happy to share my retail client templates! And I’ll definitely take you up on that cortado when I’m in Chicago!

3

Elena, fellow QuickBooks refugee! For POS integration, I built a simple CSV importer that processes daily transaction logs. Most modern POS systems can export CSV. I wrote a Python script that categorizes sales by product type and handles tips separately. Happy to share the code! Your inventory challenge is interesting - maybe track by units and use FIFO costing? Also, I’m in Chicago next month for a conference - definitely taking you up on that cortado offer! :hot_beverage: