Whether you knew it was coming or not, the big day is finally here. Today’s the day you get your ✨ barcode ✨. Aka Barcode Day.
You might be thinking: Why would that be a big deal? Well, hear us out. Barcode Day is cause for celebration. From this day forward, your products enter a whole new (more physical) world of sales. And that new barcode on your products is your ticket to this bigger, better world.
But before we get too carried away with the festivities, let’s take a look at how we arrived here. In this little write-up, we’ll break down all the reasons to get barcodes for your products, why it matters how you get them, and how these barcodes will help you meet consumer demands now and in the future.
The future is omnichannel
Did you know that if your biz sells products or services solely through online platforms, you’re twice as likely as your brick-and-mortar pals to report that you’re *not* bringing in the big bucks? Yep—pure DTC might help you reach your customers more directly, but it’s not helping you reach more customers overall.
So how do you increase your reach and your revenue? The answer is diversification. You gotta meet your customers everywhere they are—online and in stores. And having a flexible, interoperable supply chain will help you do just that.
If you’re part of the 66% of DTC companies facing increasing customer acquisition costs as their main challenge in achieving their growth goals, it’s time to diversify.
Barcodes are your BFF
Enough talk about why you should diversify—let’s dig into how you do it. The most practical solution for diversifying your sales channels outside of DTC is to use barcodes. Getting an ~official barcode~ helps manage, track, and uniquely identify your products.
But where you get your barcodes matters too. You need to be sure your barcodes are unique, legitimate, accurate, and globally recognized. Phew! Seems like a lot, right? That’s the beauty of working with the not-for-profit organization GS1: They already have standards in place for their barcodes.
These important GS1 standards were created to help you give your product its own identity in the supply chain and to help your partners keep track of where it goes and when it’s sold:
- Global trade item number: Your GTIN is used to individually identify all of your trade items—basically any products or services that are priced, ordered, or invoiced at any point in the supply chain.
- Universal product code: Your UPC is the barcode used to help consumers sail through checkout. It also carries your GTIN. The best part? These barcodes and unique numbers issued by GS1 are accepted by major retailers and distributors everywhere.
- 2D barcodes: Your 2D (two-dimensional) barcode is like the UPC, but it stores waaaaay more data.
And these li’l 2D guys are getting only more and more popular. In fact, you’ve probably seen one type of them everywhere in the past few years: the ubiquitous QR code.
In fact, consumers love 2D barcodes (like the QR code) so much that brands are making moves to upgrade to 2D from the UPC code at a record pace. So if you want to take advantage of storytelling opportunities through your package and become more accessible to consumers, you need to hop on the barcode bandwagon.
That’s right—barcodes have been evolving to meet the demands for more information by incorporating new tech behind them. 2D barcodes can provide almost limitless opportunities to engage and inform, and shoppers are here for it.
Bring on the big day
Ready to boogie down for Barcode Day? GS1, our resident barcode DJ (yes, we’re making that a thing), can help your barcodes meet all the necessary requirements and provide all the info your consumers are looking for.
See you at the Barcode Day parade.