Labeling is a vital aspect of various industries that delivers essential information, yet it generates a considerable environmental footprint. For instance, an application using 6,000 ribbons annually with a standard roll configuration (110mm x 300m) can consume up to 833 kg of plastics, equivalent to nearly 25,000 plastic bottles.1  As environmental protection becomes increasingly important, many businesses are now seeking greener products and solutions to decrease their environmental impact to comply with regulations, contribute to sustainability, and win customers. Automatic labeling is a standard practice for fulfilling high-volume labeling applications. However, to reduce the environmental impact of these processes, print and apply professionals are dedicated to using greener solutions, such as ribbon-saving functions.

Rising demand for automation and complex labeling applications has made automatic labeling grow in importance across various industries. Increasing customization, labeling requirements, and technological advances have led many businesses to search for solutions that help them cope with these growing demands while improving productivity and efficiency.

Whether you are a retailer, supplier, or intermediary such as a logistics partner, the importance of selecting the right RFID partners, printers and equipment cannot be overstated. RFID is complex. In a recent RFID presentation from the world’s leading retailer, their overriding message was, “RFID is difficult but worth it.” This means that selecting the right partners and equipment is often the critical difference between success and failure.

As a supplier, we hope you are ready to begin applying RFID labels to your products for your retail customers. In this blog, we’ll detail the steps you need to follow to properly tag your items with RFID.

Do you supply products to a major retailer? If so, your customer might have mandated you begin RFID-tagging your products. What are some RFID basics to help you comply with this requirement?

Items with RFID labels are now arriving at your brick-and-mortar stores. Hopefully, you view this as great news. What do you need to keep in mind to take advantage of these newly tagged items?

Successful RAIN RFID implementations in the retail industry depend on global standards to ensure that products are trackable across the value chain from the manufacturer through logistics partners and ultimately to the retailer. Regardless of the tags and equipment in use, who encoded the tags, or who is reading the tags, actors and trading partners in the retail value chain rely on standards to ensure interoperability.

In our previous blog, we outlined some of the challenges retailers and suppliers face when implementing e-commerce operations. From inventory management to choosing the most efficient labeling supplies, there’s a lot to consider when integrating e-commerce operations into your enterprise. In this blog, we will take a look at how RFID can help solve some of those challenges.

It’s virtually impossible to ignore the increase in retail e-commerce over the past five years. Even before COVID, e-commerce was accelerating rapidly. The limitations imposed during the pandemic not only accelerated e-commerce operations at an even faster rate but also made these operations business-critical for many retailers.

Changing any part of a print-and-apply system requires tremendous effort for Systems Integrators (SI). Taking print engine replacement as an example, SIs will have to reconfigure system settings or purchase new parts, spending additional time and resources.