In a down economy, it’s inspiring to see so many entrepreneurial spirits. But, if you’re going to be selling a product, you’re going to need a barcode.

If you’re in the US, you’ll need to visit the GS1 website. Then, fill out the application. You’ll need to know estimated annual sales, approximate number of products you need barcodes for and contact information. From there, you’ll receive a GS1 company prefix, which can be used to create the barcode numbers for every product that you plan on selling.

However, getting a barcode is not free. The initial fee is approximately $760 for 100 barcodes, but varies. This also includes licensing to your company prefix for the year, and a smaller annual renewal fee will reoccur in order to continue using the prefix.

Once you’ve applied, received your prefix and paid, you’ll need to create a UPC barcode. Check out our free barcode generator and learn more about barcoding your product.

If you’re thinking about implementing an RFID solution within your organization, the GS1 can help. The GS1 recently launched a Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) Tool that allows companies to perform an initial analysis and risk assessment on implementing RFID and EPC technologies.

The PIA is for both large corporations and medium to small enterprises who are in need of an EPC/RFID application. By using the tool, companies can:

• Perform a comprehensive assessment of privacy tisks of any new EPC/RFID implementation
• Identify privacy controls to be incorporated at the early stages of development
• Comply with the Eurpoean Comission’s RFID Recommendation and EPC Privacy Guidelines
• Ensure that companies protect their customer’s privacy, increasing customer confidence in RFID technology

Essentially, when your company implements RFID applications, they may need to collect personal information about customers. Ensuring the privacy of these customers is of the utmost importance, so an RFID PIA can help asses the privacy risks and identify the necessary measure to address them before privacy is compromised.
Get the tool, or learn more about RFID implementation.

Has your organization recently undergone an RFID implementation? Share your struggles and successes by commenting below, or on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Smartphones have caused consumer purchasing behavior to change. Find out how to protect your brand in the mobile age.

The GS1 recently conducted a report in conjunction with Capgemini that explains how the smartphone is playing a critical role in consumer purchasing behavior, and what companies can do to help influence consumer behavior.

According to the report, “Beyond the Label: Providing Digital Information Consumers Can Trust,” increased smartphone usage has lead to an increase in demand from consumers for more information, which in turn, has lead to an explosion of data from a wide variety of sources.

In fact, over two-thirds of consumers want nutrition and ingredient information and over 30 percent of smartphone users have downloaded a barcode scanning app. However, depending on where their searches take them, consumers are becoming more and more frustrated with incorrect product information.

In some cases, 91 percent of mobile barcode scans returned incorrect product information, so it’s no wonder consumers are getting frustrated. What’s more, is that 38 percent of consumers will not purchase a product if they don’t trust the information they get on a smartphone, and 35 percent might stop using an app if it lead them to the wrong information.

So, what can brands do to prevent this? In some cases, such as third-party or “crowd-sourced” sites, brand managers have little control over the information posted. However, managing your brand should focus on data integrity and collaboration with other companies and sources to ensure an enhanced consumer researching experience. Learn more on how to protect your brand in the mobile age.

The GS1 provides standards for barcodes in addition to general business standards such as electronic messaging and data synchronization. The GS1 also provides training and support for the implementation of international standards.

The GS1 also works collaboratively with the ISO, or the International Organization for Standardization, which is the world’s largest developer of standards. The GS1 and ISO both share the same passion for the importance of global standardization. For this reason, many of the GS1’s standards are ISO-compliant and the GS1 has adopted many ISO standards such as identification, GS1 barcodes, electronic data interchange and RFID.

For more information about the relationship between GS1 and ISO, download the brochure here.

With ever-changing business standards and the constant need to invent new ones, there becomes a need to keep track of all the terminology associated with such standards. The storage for these terms is the GS1 Global Data Dictionary, or GDD, which allows users to search for the information they need in a variety of different ways.

GDD Search
Look up business terms and display associated documents, definitions and data types.

GDD Reports
View all of the information related to a business message in a technical document.

GDD Code Lists
View code list values and value definitions of GS1 code lists.

Extended Attributes
The GS1 realizes that there are local data needs and specific trading partner needs that are not supported in the global standard today, thus the need for extended attributes.

GS1 Standards Knowledge Center
Access published GSMP standards documents and implementation guides.

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