Barcoding News

Jumbo is the largest toy retailer in Greece and customer service is at the top of its business agenda. Every day, hundreds of customers buy goods from its 35 stores. The company has an excellent reputation for offering the broadest selection of toys in the market at the best prices.

Customer service, reducing costs and improving productivity are key factors in helping Jumbo to drive and expand its business, and to achieve this, Jumbo recently decided to automate its labelling, price control and stock replenishment procedures.

Previously, such procedures were handled by a central PC workstation connected to a thermal printer in each store. Periodical stock replenishment was carried out manually by employees, who checked the shelves and recorded depleted items. This data was entered again manually into the workstation, and the stock replenishment list printed and forwarded to the outlet’s warehouse. Labels advertising prices, promotions and offers were arranged on the workstation, and printed on a thermal printer. When new stock was placed on the shelves, employees had to take the printed labels, go to the respective shelves and place them under the right items.

Introduction of mobile printers
Jumbo was already very familiar with automation, having first installed automated print procedures in 1996. However, to meet its key business objectives, Jumbo identified that it needed a faster and more flexible mobile printing application. The company was forced to seek a new supplier to help it achieve this, and turned to leading manufacturer of on-demand printing solutions, Zebra Technologies. Subsequently, Jumbo upgraded its stock replenishment system with Zebra QL 420 mobile printers.

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Challenge
Since Milo Jones sold his first sausage in 1889, the Jones Dairy Farm has been making great sausage in Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin, from a cherished family recipe. Today, six generations later, the Jones family still operates the original farm and maintains its high quality standards.

However, the company’s distribution has grown considerably. It now sells its products online, in stores across the country, as well as in Canada, Japan and Hong Kong. The innovative company was the first in the meat industry to quick-freeze, one of the first to introduce fully-cooked breakfast sausage, and was early to operate a modern bacteriological chemical laboratory.

More recently, Jones Dairy decided to implement a direct store delivery (DSD) application with elements of route accounting for enhanced efficiency and customer service. Previously, Jones Dairy delivery staff had to go back and forth to their trucks to gather and print data for transactions, relying on manual entry using pen and paper forms.

Solution
Jones Dairy coupled Motorola® MC70 mobile computers with Zebra’s RW 420 mobile printers.

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British Sky Broadcasting uses the Intermec CN3 to help improve service for its 9.2 million customers.

The Posiflex PP8000 thermal receipt printer is specially adapted for all environments. To improve the graphic printing speed, the baud rate has been increased to 115200 bps via RS232 and the print speed has been increased to 220 mm/sec. The PP8000 has a streamlined, lightweight design, but is capable of working in harsh environments and has an optional top cover for dust and splash resistance. The Aura 8000 is a (3-1) printer with Serial, Parallel, and USB interfaces built in.

Challenge
Headquartered in Boulder, Colorado, Charter Baking Company, a portfolio company of Charterhouse Group, Inc. and North America’s leading supplier of natural and organic bread and baked goods, is dedicated to bringing consumers a variety of the finest natural and organic breads without the use of any artificial ingredients or preservatives. The company distributes branded products from Rudi’s Organic Bakery, The Vermont Baking Company, The Baker, and Matthew’s Bread to supermarkets, mass retailers and a host of independent natural food stores across the U.S. In order to continue to ensure the freshness of its products, Charter Baking wanted to make sure all products were delivered accurately and on-time to meet its customers’ needs.

In 2007, Charter reached out a leading provider of handheld and host software to the route distribution and food processing industries. The company began its relationship when it bought Vermont Bakeries.

“We had been using a variety of disparate route accounting systems in various locales, including manual systems, and we were lacking the real-time visibility of inventory and sales data that could help us plan production for maximum sales, profitability and customer service,” said Andy Artzer, CIO of Charter Baking Company.

“Manual transactions at the store delivery level slowed down drivers’ productivity and efficiency and were a hindrance to our growth. In addition, the lack of real-time sales/inventory information and sales integration with our back-office planning system made forecasting and production planning a challenge. As a result, we experienced higher return rates in some regions or stores and out-of-stocks in others. Now, with the new system we can do more accurate forecasting by region and by store.”

Based on its needs, Charter Baking selected a sales tracking, ordering, route settlement, mobile/wireless route accounting/direct-store-delivery solution. The application runs on any Microsoft Windows Mobile device and the Charter Baking implementation utilizes Motorola MC9090 rugged mobile computers with a keypad designed specifically for DSD and Zebra RW 420 mobile/wireless receipt printers. Transaction data from each route is uploaded
daily into Charter’s host system application called “Bakers Dozen”.

“We specified Zebra’s mobile technology as a result of an evaluation our company conducted on mobile printers in the marketplace, in which Zebra ranked highest on its usability, rugged construction, printing quality and superior battery life,” explains Artzer. “With the old system it was difficult to decipher the drivers’ handwriting. Now, with the mobile printers, all the printouts are clear and legible.”

Using the handheld mobile/wireless solution, Charter’s drivers can complete delivery route transactions quickly and conveniently. With the mobile computer and printer, Charter’s mobile workers can issue invoices, print receipts, collect signatures, enter credits for returns and accept payments on the spot, then communicate these transactions to the host system. Product and quantity data can be entered either by scanning the product’s UPC code or entering the number into the handheld.

“Implementing the system has helped us streamline delivery operations for drivers and provides us with significantly greater accountability and accuracy on product sales across all locations,” states Artzer. “As a result, we can identify and optimize sales opportunities and ensure that production, distribution and product placement are done in the most advantageous manner to serve our customers.”

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The challenge
Previously drivers used either handwritten or printed carbon paper forms, making the creation of new documents slow and difficult. This caused a multitude of complaints due to errors or problems reading the documents.

The Objectives
The main purpose of the project was to speed up the distribution process and enable distributors to correct orders when making deliveries, preventing errors when creating the document and during the final invoicing process. In addition, SIH wanted to increase the quality of its printed receipts and invoices printed on mobile printers and reduce the cost of excessive paper consumption.

The Solution
Using Zebra QL 420TM and RW 420TM wireless mobile printers along with Symbol MC9060 terminals, orders can now be corrected during delivery. It is now possible to make changes and print on demand without wasting paper. Thanks to this new process, the distributor now has a record of all the work carried out en route during the course of the day. This is achieved by uploading data to the central system using a Symbol terminal.

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The EVO TouchPC and EVO Touch Monitor are the first entries to the new EVO family. Both feature a sleek modern look, ultra compact footprint and design, and an extremely attractive price point. All EVO products include core level specifications that meet industry requirements, yet deliver industry leading prices to meet all budgets. In addition, all EVO products carry POS-X’s industry leading 2-Day Advanced Replacement Protection free of charge for the entire three year warranty.

“People will be blown away by the quality they receive at such a low price point”, says Dan Moseley, President and CEO of POS-X, Inc., “Despite the low price, all EVO products are developed with the highest quality standards – which is why we are backing our products with our free Advanced Replacement Protection.”

EVO TouchPC

The new EVO Fanless TouchPC features superior build quality paired with Ultra Low Voltage (ULV) technology, resulting in a truly fanless design. With an energy efficient Intel Atom 1.6ghz CPU, 80GB HDD and up to 2GB RAM, the new EVO TouchPC achieves a high level of performance at a price point that can not be matched. Perfect for retail and hospitality applications, options include a rear VFD customer display, 8.4″ rear LCD display and integrated 3-track MSR.

EVO Touch Monitor

Utilizing the same sophisticated design of the EVO TouchPC, the new 15″ EVO LCD Touch Monitor features 5-Wire Resistive Touch, USB interface, VGA input, and cable management built directly into the base. Options include wall mount bracket (standard VESA) and integrated 3-track MSR.

Challenge:
Provenant Health Partners, a group of affiliated Denver-area hospitals, needed a profitable and reliable system to replace its older card embossing machines. These machines were costly and cumbersome to use. They were also unreliable; imprints of the cards were illegible four to six percent of the time.

Solution:
The hospitals installed Zebra® Stripe® thermal transfer printers to replace the card embossing machines. Hospital employees no longer sent the cards to every department to mark records, but merely printed labels to identify the records of each patient. Bar code labels mark patients’ file folders, order sheets and patient wristbands.

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On October 7, Google replaced the logo on its home page with a barcode that had “GOOGLE” encoded in it.

The barcode logo generated a lot of press coverage and a lot of traffic to the BarcodesInc free barcode generator, which has now generated over 42 million barcodes!

Star Micronics America Announces Printer Compatibility with Mac OS X Snow Leopard

Star Micronics America is proud to announce that its lines of single and multifunction printers are compatible with the latest Mac Operating System-Snow Leopard. Star is currently supporting customers who have upgraded their Mac operating systems.

“Star Micronics is one of the few printer companies to embrace the Mac community and has always played a pivotal role in the Mac POS market. Making sure we were ready to support customers for Snow Leopard, at its release time, is the most recent example of that role,” said David Salisbury, Product Manager of Star Micronics America. “Star Micronics is pleased to announce that the current version of the Mac CUPS drivers (3.0) are fully compatible with what will no doubt be a popular operating system.”

Star Micronics’ technical support department has already developed numerous application notes to assist users who are upgrading to Snow Leopard. The application notes discuss topics including:

• How to install a Star USB printer on Snow Leopard
• How to install a Star Ethernet printer on Snow Leopard
• How to install the Star TSP100/TSP100GT printers on Snow LeopardRequests for the application notes may be sent to [email protected].