When purchasing a product, whether it is from a retail outlet, grocery store, or even an online retailer, you have probably noticed that every item has a barcode either on or attached to it. This barcode, or Universal Product Code (UPC), was created to enable quicker checkout and more efficient inventory tracking. While it started within grocery stores, this categorization and methodology quickly spread to all forms of retail.
UPCs are given to a manufacturer by the GS1, and to enter and be a part of the UPC system, the manufacturer must apply and pay an annual fee. The GS1 then gives them a unique 6 digit GS1 company prefix. With the standard 12 digits of a UPC barcode, the first 6 digits are for the company’s identification, the next 5 digits are the item number, and the last digit is a check digit. Although there exists UPCs that may range anywhere from 8-14 digits, such as an International Article Number (Europe), North America most commonly uses the 12 digit GTIN-12, or UPC-A.
In regards to the 5 digit number following the company prefix, it is the manufacturer’s UPC coordinator that is in charge of assigning these numbers to identify items. They also work to ensure that they don’t repeat, as well as retire numbers for products that are not sold anymore. It is important to note that all variations of an item, such as size, packing, etc. must have their own number. This is because when a scanner scans a product, it communicates with the store’s POS computer conducting a UPC lookup to identify the item and give the correct price. The last number, the check digit, is used to tell the scanner if the item was scanned correctly. This works by the fact that the check digit is a calculation of the previous digits as a security measure. If the calculation is done and the numbers do not match, then there is clearly something wrong.
With UPC Codes, the ease and efficiency of sales and stocking is greatly increased. Rather than having to manually enter how many items have been shipped to a store, or check a price, one quick scan can achieve the whole process almost instantaneously. This allows a much more accurate inventory of the store, as well as ensures less mistakes are made. In the case of a problem with an item, it also becomes much easier to track down the item and issue a recall or notification as needed.
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