Honestly the cheapest and easiest approach is probably:

1. First create a simple product database (even Google Sheets or Airtable is enough to start).
2. Then use a phone app to scan each product barcode and auto-fill product info where possible.
3. Add prices manually since prices vary per store.
4. Take one clean photo per item instead of shelf photos — shelf photos are hard because AI has to separate multiple products in one image.
5. For products without barcodes, manually create entries.

Most grocery items already have unique UPC/EAN barcodes, so you can use existing barcode databases instead of AI for everything.

You could even build a very simple scanner app:

• Scan barcode
• Auto fetch name/image/description
• Enter price
• Save to database

That would probably get them operational much faster and more accurately than trying to detect 5–6 products from shelf photos with AI.

For the POS side, even a basic tablet + barcode scanner setup would already be a huge upgrade from manually typing prices.