Toronto-based retail technology provider Tulip unveiled its newest offering, Tulip Pay, in January 2023 to streamline checkout and payments for brick-and-mortar retailers. Powered by Stripe‘s payment processing capabilities, the plug-and-play solution looks to solve pain points around integration and maintenance while bundling transactions into Tulip‘s existing POS infrastructure.
The Rapid Rise of Retail Technology
Founded in 2013, Tulip has fast become a leader in mobile-based retail tools for customers like COACH, Kate Spade, and Michael Kors. The company perfectly timed its entrance to capitalize on surging industry tailwinds.
The global retail tech market has expanded at breakneck pace over the past decade as software and hardware innovations transform store operations. Valued at $20.6 billion in 2020, one report projects the industry ballooning to $62.5 billion by 2028 – a compound annual growth rate of 16.1% [1].
Much of this worldwide growth traces back to the seismic shifts in consumer preferences and expectations of the 21st century retail experience.
As online shopping exploded in popularity through the 2000s, consumers increasingly expected to find competitive pricing, broad product selection and rapid fulfillment in every channel. Retailers who failed to deliver on these fronts saw sales bleed to eCommerce giants like Amazon at alarming rates.
However, the allure of physical stores endured for categories like fashion and luxury. Tactile, personalized and experiential elements remained lacking online. Forward-thinking merchants recognized emerging mobile and cloud technologies as the bridge to fuse digital convenience with real-world charm.
Thus the market emerged for solutions delivering digital transformation across areas like:
- POS Software: Modernizing static cash wraps with mobile checkout, clienteling and inventory lookup
- Payments: Unifying online and offline tender types into seamless systems
- Kiosks: Providing endless aisles and virtual catalogues in-store
- Beacons: Enabling contextual notifications and contactless interactions
And so companies like Tulip found themselves at the forefront of reinventing brick-and-mortar for the digital age by making cloud retail technology accessible for merchants rather than a hindrance.
Tulip‘s Mobile-First Approach to In-Store Transformation
The spark for Tulip came while CEO Ali Asaria walked through a Home Depot, observing employees struggling with cumbersome mobile devices meant to enhance their store experience capabilities [2].
He envisioned smarter mobile software and founded Tulip to replace antiquated systems with an elegant tablet interface. One that delivered associates feature-rich applications without complicated setups or training.
"The Home Depot had deployed thousands of mobile devices in their stores to improve customer service. It was a great vision, but watching the confused associates struggle with their devices, the implementation was clearly lacking. That’s when it struck me…there had to be a better way to mobilize retail employees." – Ali Asaria, Tulip CEO
The result became Tulip‘s cornerstone product, the Tulip Retail Productivity Platform. Cloud-based and iOS-native, the software transforms any iPad into a capable point of sale, inventory lookup, clienteling and merchandising hub.
Without migrating servers or managing infrastructure, stores equip employees with Tulip devices to look up products, process payments, coordinate orders, access customer purchase history and make recommendations. Streamlined onboarding and an intuitive interface translate to immediate value driving higher online-equivalent conversion rates.
Beyond the out-of-the-box capabilities, Tulip‘s infrastructure supports advanced customizations for retailers to build immersive brand experiences. Whether empowering staff with clienteling tools or integrating IoT to support interactive fitting rooms, the platform remains the consistent, reliable base.
This versatility and commitment to simplifying innovation for retailers has earned Tulip backing from top-tier investors like Kleiner Perkins and RRE Ventures [3]. In 2021, the company raised a $40 million Series C at a valuation of $500 million [4].
Today Tulip provides mobile and self-service solutions to 150+ global enterprises with 50,000 software seats in over 30 countries. Maintaining these cloud systems comes courtesy of $104 million in total funding.
The impressive rise leaves Tulip well-positioned to scale according to industry forecasts. Adoption of SaaS retail tech should grow at a CAGR of 11% through 2028 [1] – a segment where Tulip repeatedly ranks among the most innovative vendors [5].
As the digital transformation pacesetter, Tulip will continue releasing forward-looking solutions like Tulip Pay that simplify emerging technologies for retailers.
Tulip Pay Brings Stripe‘s Payment Expertise In-Store
To enable the new integrated payments functionality within the Tulip POS, Tulip has partnered with Stripe Terminal. The popular payment processor‘s developer-friendly tools and pre-certified card readers make it simple for platforms like Tulip to bundle smooth payments with limited additional hardware or maintenance.
With support for over 100 global payment methods, multi-currency and crypto acceptance, Stripe also allows Tulip Pay to keep up with the latest consumer payment trends. This includes growing adoption in North America of:
- Mobile wallet payments (~33% by 2025) [6]
- Buy now pay later installment plans (~11% transaction share by 2025) [7]
- Cryptocurrency rewards and cashback (~$327B transaction volume by 2028) [8]
For retailers, it means they can upgrade POS systems to current payment standards without needing to overhaul entire systems. Tulip handles combining the technologies behind the scenes into a unified management portal while providing one point of contact for support.
This aligns with Tulip‘s ethos of demystifying retail technology so merchants can instead focus innovation efforts on customer experience rather than upkeep.
Why Integrated Payments Matter in Retail
On the surface, combining a robust POS system like Tulip‘s with integrated payments in the form of Tulip Pay seems logical. But the data underscores why the simplified approach can prove transformative for merchants competing in the digital era.
The global payment processing sector currently sits at a ~$3 trillion market value as of 2022 [9]. Breaking this down:
- eCommerce payments gaining explosive traction, projected to hit $207 billion transaction value by 2025 [10]
- But brick-and-mortar purchases still dominate, with in-store payments topping $10 trillion in 2021 [11]
As more enterprise brands embrace unified commerce strategies, that line between online and offline payments blurs. Providing the digital capabilities consumers expect regardless of channel requires coordinated systems.
This translates the tech considerations around payments into a massive headache – from hardware to network protocols to security regulations. Integrating any POS upgrade means re-examining components of:
- Card readers
- Cash drawers
- Receipt printers
- PIN pads
- Reporting databases
And that‘s before considering the software compatibility with various gateways, acquirers, modifiers, and processing entities that turn payments from pending charges into settled funds in a bank account.
What retailers need are turnkey commerce ecosystems converging all these entities. Tulip CEO Ali Asaria recognizes the importance of this simplified approach.
“The retail technology landscape is getting more and more complex. Tulip’s vision is to make our POS system a one-stop-shop…Tulip Pay was created [with this in mind]…We believe retailers will appreciate bundling these two logical components into one.”
It‘s the exact motivation that made Stripe Co-Founder John Collison passionate about building an integrated suite tailored for merchants.
"If we can give developers and businesses all the infrastructure they need to build better payment products, we have the potential to fundamentally re-architect how the entire internet works with money." – John Collison, Stripe Cofounder & President [12]
This shared ideology now converges as Tulip Pay looks to further reduce friction in enabling retailers to deliver next-gen commerce capabilities matching rising consumer expectations in the 2020s.
How Tulip and Stripe Align As Retail Payments Partners
As two technology innovators looking to provide accessible digital building blocks for merchants, Tulip and Stripe land as logical partners for payments.
Stripe began in 2010 when founders Patrick and John Collison – themselves former engineers and company builders – grew frustrated with the difficulty of integrating payments into online businesses. What emerged from Stripe‘s San Francisco HQ over the next decade became the gold standard for modern payment infrastructure.
The developer-centric tools abstract away much complexity while providing unmatched flexibility to customize for unique business models. Pre-built integrations support marketplaces, subscriptions, invoicing and global payouts alongside traditional card acceptance.
For all the high-tech servers powering Stripe‘s financial networks, the company also works extensively to enable hybrid offline transactions. Products like Stripe Terminal cater to the needs of retail merchants requiring point-of-sale systems with integrated payments, optimized checkout flows and omni-channel reporting.
Key capabilities of Stripe Terminal include:
- Pre-certified card readers and POS hardware
- Mobile SDKs for iOS and Android
- Plug-and-play NFC, chip card readers
- Reporting across online and offline sales
- Global payment methods
- Dynamic checkout flows
- Tokenization and encryption
This well-rounded feature set now augments Tulip‘s own Retail Productivity Platform, equipping mobile devices with payments at the tap of a button.
On Stripe‘s side, the partnership further cements standing as the connective payment tissue empowering next-gen commerce experiences shoppers demand. "Tulip shares our goal of accelerating the future of in-store retail technology with intuitive, delightfully simple products retailers will love to use," raves Rachel McKenzie, Stripe‘s Global Head of Grocery and Partner Solutions.
"We’re thrilled to work together to drive the new standard for innovation in store operations, associate productivity, and checkout."
For retailers stuck managing disjointed systems built piecemeal over years of shifting technology, it‘s a long-awaited integrated solution.
Tulip Paves the Way for Innovation by Simplifying Retail Technology
Early success demonstrated consumer affinity for physical retail experiences remains strong when powered by digital convenience. As the store channel races to catch up, technology sits at the intersection.
Tulip designed its cloud platform from inception to drive this next generation of mobile-enabled, personalized and contextual commerce in brick-and-mortar stores. With retail technology spend rapidly accelerating into 2025, the company launched at precisely the right moment.
The biggest barriers retailers face in keeping pace often come down to implementation friction and change management struggles inherent with new systems. By abstracting infrastructure complexities into turnkey mobile software, Tulip streamlines upgrading staff capabilities and interacting with omni-channel data.
Add the recently bundled payments processing courtesy of fintech leader Stripe, and stack provides a unified modern POS ecosystem. For merchants, it means no more piecing together hardware, software and payments separately across siloed providers.
The true benefit is this simplified foundation frees retailers to invest more focus on the experiential innovations that build brand loyalty and drive sales growth. As Tulip‘s EVP of Product Management Roberto Grandillo says, “We believe retailers will appreciate bundling these two logical components into one, with a single source of support.”
With consumer-facing technology no longer the obstacle, merchants can devote energy to leveraging data analytics, personalized recommendations and contextual notifications through Tulip for next-level customer experiences.
The retail landscape shifts rapidly, but purpose-built retail clouds ensure stores have the tools needed to keep pace. Tulip Pay equips retailers for the next wave of payments innovation so the focus stays on winning today‘s digital-savvy customers.
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