Barcodes

[unstoppable]

Hi,

We have a wholesale business and as part of it we import some decorative items - in the region of 50-100 products. We don't have barcodes on any products but have been asked a couple of times by retailers if our products are barcoded. I am aware that you can buy barcodes in bulk from sellers on amazon and eBay but I don't know the pros and cons of obtaining barcodes from there.

How do I go about having barcodes for our products in a way which is safe, legitimate and cheap?

Thanks.

 

[Mr D]

Hi,

How do I go about having barcodes for our products in a way which is safe, legitimate and cheap?

Thanks.

Get them from GS1. The only way to meet all 3 requirements is to get from the only authorised source you can verify.

 

[Norman Bailey]

Barcodes simply make stock control a lot easier, they normally encode the part number in a format which is machine readable. You can print them yourself on standard labels eg Avery. Just watch the barcode font as they are not all the same. Type 128 is a good general font.

 

[GTL]

gs 1 .

 

[unstoppable]

How much would 50-100 barcodes cost from gs1. I think there’s a yearly fee too?

 

[Mr D]

The same price as 1000 codes would be.
£119 a year.

 

[unstoppable]

Is that in addition to the yearly membership fee? Thanks.

 

[Mr D]

That is the yearly membership fee for the smallest business.
Higher turnover pay slightly more.

 

[unstoppable]

Sorry, just to be clear do I have to pay £119 annually for the barcodes ON TOP of the yearly membership fee?

 

[Mr D]

Sorry, just to be clear do I have to pay £119 annually for the barcodes ON TOP of the yearly membership fee?

No.
The annual fee is for the barcodes. You pay that, nothing else.
If you want more barcodes later then the fee increases but the price per code comes down. So 2000 barcodes are not double 1000.

 

[Deleted member 59730]

You still need software to generate the barcode artwork.

 

[Mr D]

You still need software to generate the barcode artwork.

If actually printing barcodes.
Not needed for online selling though pretty much needed for selling to shops.

 

[Noah]

You still need software to generate the barcode artwork.

...available free online (as in Web sites that generate the barcode graphic for you).

Not providing a link because life is complicated.

 

[Deleted member 59730]

...available free online (as in Web sites that generate the barcode graphic for you).

By the time you have found an online barcode generator which will produce barcodes in all useful formats you might as well save time and buy a proper piece of software.

 

[Noah]

By the time you have found an online barcode generator which will produce barcodes in all useful formats you might as well save time and buy a proper piece of software.

Probably true if you have 50+ and the prospect of more; if you just need a dozen or so, free might be good enough.

 

[Mr D]

As a small business I cannot afford GS1 barcodes they just cost way too much. I buy EAN barcodes from Uniqueproductcodes.com every since i started selling on Amazon. Never had an issue. Amazon never had a problem either. I highly recommend them but if you want to buy from GS1 then you should.

You mean amazon don't have a problem with them yet.
Give it time, amazon have been working through the catalogue only a couple of years. Some have had to create new product pages from scratch which of course are low in search results.

 

[ara]

If Amazon truly had a problem why would they let sellers still use non GS1 barcodes when submitting a new listing? Surely they would put something in place where it stops new listings with non GS1 barcodes from being listed and then crack down on all the listings that have already been submitted. I think they know they will lose a lot of sellers if they push this through and i don't know anyone that has been affected by this policy yet.

 

[Mr D]

If Amazon truly had a problem why would they let sellers still use non GS1 barcodes when submitting a new listing? Surely they would put something in place where it stops new listings with non GS1 barcodes from being listed and then crack down on all the listings that have already been submitted. I think they know they will lose a lot of sellers if they push this through and i don't know anyone that has been affected by this policy yet.

Presumably because it takes time to check that the code is valid as belonging to the product or the seller.

Amazon isn't set up for a few million sellers each with their own barcodes creating new listings.

 

[Noah]

As a small business I cannot afford GS1 barcodes they just cost way too much.

Annual licence for minimum # (1,000 ?) codes from GS1 is £119. While not trivial, that does not seem "way too much".

 

[ara]

Annual licence for minimum # (1,000 ?) codes from GS1 is £119. While not trivial, that does not seem "way too much".

£119 every year. I don't pay annual fees just a one time payment. For 1000 barcodes on Unique Product Codes it costs £99.99.

uniqueproductcodes.com check the prices yourself.

 

[ara]

Plus i only need around 100 barcodes which costs £24.99

 

[Noah]

Plus i only need around 100 barcodes which costs £24.99

Fair enough. I am curious, if you could indulge me please : when you query your product bar codes (on GS1 or similar - NOT on uniqueproductcodes.com), do they show as belonging to your company?

 

[SuT]

We don't pay annual fee. One-off payment. From barcodesegypt


In the 1990’s GS1 was established in most parts of the world. They licensed their 13 digit barcode numbers to their members (and as discussed previously charged both membership fees and joining fees). However, there was a separate organisation in the USA – the Uniform Code Council (UCC) – which sold 12 digit barcode numbers to their members for a one-off cost (there were no ongoing license fees). The UCC was effectively competing with GS1. Their 12 digits numbers were effectively a subset of the 13 digit system.

In the late 1990s, the UCC merged with GS1, becoming GS1-US. As part of this change, they decided to start charging annual license fees for all of their members, including those who had paid a one-off fee for barcode numbers in the 1990s. Of course, many of these members weren’t happy with the new annual license fees, and so a group of them ended up in class action law suit with GS1. The members won in the courts in the early 2000s, resulting in a multimillion dollar settlement by GS1. A further consequence of this court case is the proof that the original numbers issued by the UCC in the 1990s are outside of GS1s control now, and hence no license fees are required. These are the numbers bought by resellers and onsold. They are ‘new’ numbers, in that they have never been used on a retail product, and are part of the GS1 system.

 

[Mr D]

These are the numbers bought by resellers and onsold. They are ‘new’ numbers, in that they have never been used on a retail product, and are part of the GS1 system.

Some of the resellers sell the codes to other resellers who sell on to sometimes multiple retailers. Reusing codes again and again.
Amazon and a couple of other big name companies have been known to check who the codes belong to.

 

[SuT]

The barcode numbers and images are new and they are working very well internationally. Never got into any problem. Also, they have no problem with Amazon and other online shops.

They Guarantee that:

1. Any EAN-13 or UPC-A Barcode Numbers sold are unique to you and your product – they have not been used for a retail product before, nor will they be sold to another party at any stage.
2. You will not be charged joining fees or annual membership fees. All barcodes are sold for a one-off fee.
3. Any barcode numbers purchased are legal for use worldwide. Our EAN-13 numbers are suitable for international use and UPC-A numbers are best for use in the United States.
4. All barcode numbers are checked for illegal use before being sold. At no stage can anyone legally use your barcode on their product without your permission.
5. All barcode images are supplied as high quality images in several different graphic formats.
6. The information on our website is true to the extent of our knowledge at the time. We want to help you, and will do our best to do so. However in the event that we can’t help, we will try to direct you to another company that can.

 

[Mr D]

The barcode numbers and images are new and they are working very well internationally. Never got into any problem. Also, they have no problem with Amazon and other online shops.

They Guarantee that:

1. Any EAN-13 or UPC-A Barcode Numbers sold are unique to you and your product – they have not been used for a retail product before, nor will they be sold to another party at any stage.
2. You will not be charged joining fees or annual membership fees. All barcodes are sold for a one-off fee.
3. Any barcode numbers purchased are legal for use worldwide. Our EAN-13 numbers are suitable for international use and UPC-A numbers are best for use in the United States.
4. All barcode numbers are checked for illegal use before being sold. At no stage can anyone legally use your barcode on their product without your permission.
5. All barcode images are supplied as high quality images in several different graphic formats.
6. The information on our website is true to the extent of our knowledge at the time. We want to help you, and will do our best to do so. However in the event that we can’t help, we will try to direct you to another company that can.

What the barcodes will not do is refer to your business.

 

[GTL]

Frankly, for peace of mind, £119 quid per year suits me.

 

[Noah]

A barcode is a visual, machine-readable representation of data; the data usually describes something about the object that carries the barcode. Traditional barcodes systematically represent data by varying the widths and spacings of parallel lines, and may be referred to as linear or one-dimensional.

Don't be a tart.

 

[BarCodesTalk]

Like SuT said, GS1's class action suit & settlment in 2002 is why there is a legal option.

Not every store allows you to own your GTINs, some (being in business with GS1) force you to rent from GS1 directly.

We strive to provide an up to date list of which stores have this costly requirement on our site.

Thankfully most stores globally use GTIN's (UPC's & EAN's) as they were invented to be used. Ownership is far more affordable then most realize.