Labor management software helps business owners manage their labor costs, create schedules, control access to store information, and make staffing decisions. For retailers, connecting labor management software to store data allows you to make decisions based on sales and traffic numbers.
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported that retail saw 432,000 quits in May 2026, a rate of 2.8%. This is up from 404,000 quits, a rate of 2.6% in May 2025. High leads to more onboarding and schedule changes. The right labor management software can help your retail brand manage staff productivity while identifying pain points.
This article covers what labor management software is, which features matter for retail stores, how to find the right tool, and how Shopify fits into your tech stack.
What is labor management software?
Labor management software is a tool that helps businesses plan scheduling needs, monitor labor costs, track hours and attendance, and manage employee access to tools and systems.
But in retail, it should do even more than that. For retailers, the right labor management software integrates directly with your store data so that it can help you manage your team based on sales, foot traffic, peak seasons, and inventory work.
This is where the Shopify App Store comes in. Shopify and Shopify POS are able to handle all of your sales data and team accounts so you can set roles and permissions for each associate.
Labor management software vs. workforce management software
Labor management software differs from workforce management software in that the latter is a much broader tool. It encompasses HR data, absence management, forecasting, compliance, and other company needs.
Labor management software is more focused on the day-to-day operations and how staff time is used—things like scheduling, PTO requests, shift coverage, and the labor costs behind each shift.
A 10-location retailer and a 2,000-store chain both need to manage their labor, but the way they do it (and their managers’ overall needs), varies drastically. If you run a small business, you don’t need to seek out the most expensive and comprehensive system available. Focus on your specific needs.
One way for Shopify store owners to do this is by searching through the App Store to find tools that connect directly with your current store data and offer the features you need in one place.
Key features to look for in labor management software
The features you need depend on how your business is run. Key features retailers should consider when shopping for labor management software include:
| Feature | Why it matters in retail | What Shopify offers |
|---|---|---|
| Employee scheduling and shift planning | Match staff to demand by location, role, and time of day | App Store scheduling apps connected to Shopify POS |
| Time tracking and attendance | Accurate hours feed payroll and recordkeeping | POS time-tracking apps that log clock-ins on Shopify POS devices |
| Staff accounts, roles, and permissions | Limit who can issue refunds, view analytics, or change settings | Shopify staff accounts with store, organization, and POS permissions |
| Labor forecasting and sales data | Schedule against expected sales demand | Shopify POS and sales reports as scheduling inputs |
| Payroll, compliance, and recordkeeping | Reduce manual data entry and payroll errors | App Store apps that offer payroll-ready timesheets and CSV exports |
Employee scheduling and shift planning
Scheduling is the core of day-to-day labor management. Consider tools that let retailers:
- Build schedules by store location, employee role and availability, and expected store traffic
- Allow employees to request time off and shift swaps
- Match staffing demand to address overstaffing on slow days and understaffing during peak periods
- Create schedules that incorporate temporary holiday employees during high-traffic seasons
For scheduling that works for both your store and your employees, Shopify offers a number of third-party apps, including:
- PTT: POS Time Tracker. Allows team members to clock in and out from Shopify POS devices. Also includes scheduling, shift planning, timesheets that are available in your Shopify Admin, multi-location time tracking, and more.
- Easyteam for Point of Sale. Team members can clock in and out directly on Shopify POS systems, while managers can measure sales performance and create schedules, and business owners can run payroll.
- Workfeed. Create schedules based on sales and labor targets, keep track of working hours and PTO, share schedules right in the app, and even allow team communication with your own company chat.
- Homebase Time Clock. Get scheduling, free time clocks, integrated payroll, built-in messaging, plus HR and hiring capabilities.
As you shop around, ask these questions as you search for the right tool:
- Can schedules be built by store location?
- Can managers see labor cost against expected sales?
- Can staff clock in via POS?
- Can the tool export timesheets for payroll?
- Can seasonal staff be added and removed quickly?
Time tracking and attendance
Time tracking ensures accurate payroll and bookkeeping, and accurate records are an essential part of running your business. The US Department of Labor (DOL) says every FLSA-covered employer must keep certain records for each covered nonexempt worker, including accurate information about hours worked and wages earned. The DOL provides a summary of its record keeping rules.
You should be looking for labor management software that gives your team the ability to:
- Clock in and out (both for shifts and for breaks)
- Monitor overtime hours
- Export timesheets and payroll information for your records
- Manage teams, schedules, and payroll across store locations
There are many time-tracking apps available in the Shopify App Store that can integrate directly with Shopify POS to support clocking in and out, tracking hours, and exporting time sheets.
Staff accounts, roles, and permissions
Access control is also a part of labor management, helping to keep your store secure as your team grows. Team members need accounts to access the POS, but you also need to be able to set roles and permissions so managers and store associates don’t have access to the same settings and data.
Your labor management tool should support:
- Adding staff accounts to onboard new team members
- Assigning roles so junior associates, senior team members, and managers all have different access levels
- Setting POS-specific permissions like processing returns and authorizing refunds
- Temporary and seasonal employee access, plus easy offboarding
Shopify store owners can create user accounts, setting roles and permissions so only certain employees get access to internal store data. Nutrition brand Huel was able to onboard staff nine times faster using this feature in the Shopify Plus Admin.
“It’s no longer a half-hour job for me to go through and get someone access,” says Huel’s engineering director Chris Traverse.
Store owners can grant different permissions based on each employee’s role.
Some roles to consider include:
- Store associate
- Store manager
- Inventory associate
- Regional manager
- Customer service employee
- Seasonal employee
- External collaborator or agency partner
Labor forecasting and sales data
Schedules should be created based on expected demand, so look for a software that offers labor forecasting tools that help managers pinpoint how many people should be scheduled based on actual store data.
Some things that should factor into your staffing decisions include:
- Sales history. Historically busy days should have more staff on hand.
- Store location. Shops with more daily foot traffic need a larger staff than less busy locations.
- Seasonality. More hands may be needed during the holidays than the off-season.
- Promotion calendar. Days featuring major sales promotions may require more staff.
- Events. Staff days your store is holding an event with more team members to account for the potential increase in traffic.
- Fulfillment workload. Make sure you have enough inventory staff scheduled on days you’re expecting a shipment.
When building schedules based on data, you won’t be asking questions like, “How many people worked last Saturday?” You’ll instead ask, “How much demand did the store have by hour, and did staffing match it?”
Jewelry brand The Inspiration Company uses Shopify POS to run 50-plus stores across the United States. It had previously used Wix for online selling and Square for in-person selling, but switching to Shopify allowed the brand to see all sales on a single dashboard.
It also made it easy for stores to see each location’s most popular products, informing fulfillment and restocking decisions, while monitoring store and staff performance.
“Having one system to manage our inventory and staff is a huge benefit for our brand,” says co-founder Doug Waldbueser.
Payroll, compliance, and recordkeeping
Good labor management software ensures retailers have clean records, which is essential for payroll, compliance, and recordkeeping. The right tool cuts down on manual work around tracking this information and reduces paperwork to keep brands more organized.
The documentation your brand needs can include:
- Time sheets
- Payroll exports
- Break, PTO, and overtime records
- Local labor rules
- Audit trails
Shopify business owners can search the App Store for labor tracking apps that provide payroll-ready time sheets and CSV exports.
Note: Labor laws vary by country, state, province, city, and employee type. Store owners should verify wage, overtime, break, scheduling, and recordkeeping requirements with official sources or legal counsel.
Benefits of labor management software for retailers
Review the top three benefits below to see why choosing the right software is essential for your operations.
Reduce labor costs without hurting customer service
BLS data puts 2025 median hourly wages at $15.90 for cashiers and $23.18 for first-line retail supervisors. Labor management software can help retailers keep employee costs down by matching schedules to labor demand, reducing costs by ensuring you’re only paying the salaries your store actually needs to cover incoming customers.
Speed up onboarding and staff training
Onboarding and staff training can increase labor costs if staff have to teach new employees how to do the job before they can operate more independently. So, being able to onboard quickly is important.
Consistent POS workflows and role-based permissions help. Several brands have been able to improve onboarding and training with Shopify:
- Huel was able to onboard staff nine times faster with Shopify Plus admin
- PAIGE cut POS training from about two weeks to one to two days
- Bared Footwear saved an hour per employee after moving to Shopify POS
- Babylist says training on Shopify POS is intuitive and getting new employees started takes minimal lift
Use a training checklist like the one below to create your own process:
- Assign the employee’s role before their first shift
- Give each staff member a POS PIN or login workflow as applicable
- Train on checkout, returns, exchanges, discounts, and customer lookup
- Train managers on approvals and reports
- Review permissions after 30 days
Improve staff accountability and store visibility
Managers need to see who’s working, when, and what they’re doing to keep staff accountable and have visibility into store performance. This also helps managers understand when they need to coach store staff to help improve processes.
The Inspiration Company uses Shopify POS staff reports to track sales closed, average order value, and units per transaction for each of the brand’s 450-plus employees across 50-plus stores. The brand can then pinpoint which sales associates need additional coaching to boost those numbers.
How to choose labor management software
Finding the right labor management software depends on your retail brand’s specific needs. Use this step-by-step checklist as you research:
- Map current staffing workflows.
- Define user roles and permissions.
- Identify must-have integrations.
- Match features to store complexity.
- Review reporting needs.
- Compare implementation effort.
- Calculate total cost.
- Pilot before rolling out.
Start with your retail labor workflows
Before you consider buying a single tool, you need to have a clear understanding of how your store and its employee management currently works.
Ask yourself these questions:
- How many locations do you run?
- How many staff need POS access?
- How often do schedules change?
- Do you use seasonal staff?
- Do employees work across locations?
- Who approves timesheets and schedule changes?
Document your existing staff and current staff levels so you know who needs access to which parts of the admin and POS. Shopify retailers can start with built-in roles and POS staff needs, then add apps as your stores grow.
Prioritize integrations with POS, payroll, and sales data
Avoid disconnected tools. The Inspiration Company had trouble connecting their ecommerce and in-person tools before switching to Shopify for both.
Other stores had similar issues that Shopify helped them solve. Bared Footwear, for example, started with Shopify for ecommerce and Lightspeed as their in-store POS system. This led to disconnected inventory numbers and fulfillment workflow problems.“The fact that Shopify offers a great ecommerce platform and POS system that work so well together for an omnichannel business like ours made it a very easy choice,” says COO Alexandra McNab.
Another example comes from accessories brand Sea Bags. Their previous commerce stack, which included Clover POS and a Salesforce Commerce Cloud website, led to operational inefficiencies and inconsistent data collection. Shopify unified its retail and ecommerce operations, improving customer visibility across channels and saving the brand $70,000 in annual platform fees.
Tools that integrate directly with your store systems can save you time and money, and they create a better experience for your staff and customers. The same goes for your labor management tool. Ideally, you choose one that integrates directly with your POS to make it easy for team members to clock in and out of their shifts, reads in-store sales data and helps you staff accordingly, and helps you meet your inventory needs.
Compare SMB-friendly and enterprise-grade options
There are labor management software options for both small retailers and large, multichain businesses. You might have big aspirations for your brand, but you should shop for the tool that best suits your needs now, rather than in the future.
If all you need are scheduling, time tracking, and payroll exporting capabilities, you can get away with a smaller, more affordable tool. If you have multiple locations, a variety of store associate levels, in-store and online sales reporting needs, and a more complex payroll, you’ll need a mid-market option. Large retailers who need to track forecasting, compliance, union rules, labor budgets, and more across many different locations and regions will want to look into a high-level labor management software that offers these capabilities.
Use this table to help pinpoint what your brand needs:
| Stage | What labor management usually requires |
|---|---|
| One store | Basic scheduling, time tracking, payroll export |
| Several stores | Multilocation schedules, roles, permissions, staff reports |
| Pop-ups and seasonal stores | Fast staff onboarding and offboarding, temporary access |
| Omnichannel retailer | POS and ecommerce sales data tied to labor forecasting |
| Enterprise retailer | Advanced forecasting, labor budgeting, compliance workflows, API access |
Shopify can be used at any level. It offers functionality for both online and in-store order taking, lets retailers set roles and permissions for team members, and has an app store with more than 16,000 third-party apps that provide additional functionalities for your business.
Labor management software FAQ
What is labor management software?
Labor management software helps businesses create schedules, track hours, plan staffing needs, and monitor labor costs. For retailers, a good labor management software helps store owners plan scheduling so it aligns with sales, POS activity, inventory work, and other retail needs.
What is the difference between labor management software and workforce management software?
Workforce management software is a much broader tool than labor management software. It tends to house tasks like HR workflows, absence management, and compliance. Labor management software focuses more on the day-to-day of staffing, like schedules, payroll, and labor costs.
What features should retailers look for in labor management software?
Core features retailers should look for in labor management software include scheduling, time tracking, role-based permissions, POS integration, and staff performance reporting. Integration with sales data can help store managers make informed staffing decisions.
Can Shopify help with labor management?
Yes. Shopify allows business owners to create staff accounts, assign roles and permissions, track sales and inventory, and manage staff workflows. The Shopify App Store offers third-party apps that can connect with your store data to help with scheduling, time-tracking, and payroll.
How does labor management software reduce retail labor costs?
Labor management software can help retail businesses create schedules based on store data, so you’re only staffing who you actually need, when you need them, which can reduce overstaffing.
When should a retailer move beyond spreadsheets?
Spreadsheets can be a great starting point for your first store with an extremely small staff. But as you grow, or as you notice employee availability changing, you’ll need software that can keep your business organized and ensure everyone has an accurate schedule with enough time to plan.
