Color Labels out of your Zebra Printer – Very Cool

Check out this video showing Zebra’s new Color IQ system.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVgOddxG_cA

Zebra Xi4 Performance Line Printers Released

Zebra has just released the next generation of its Xi Series plinter, the Xi4 Series. The 110Xi4 was built on the legacy of the Xi series of products.The 110Xi4 was developed to improve overall operational productivity and efficiency in a variety of environments.

Some of the new features of the Xi4 Series include:

• Increased print speeds on most models. Up to 14″/356 mm per second on the 110Xi4 series for increased batch and print/apply productivity
• LCD content customizable to user needs
• Large, easy to use, multilingual LCD screen
• Flexible connectivity including simultaneous parallel/Ethernet with internal Ethernet included as standard in the product
• Advanced ribbon- and media-low LCD/e-mail alerts
• Intelligent printhead system
• RFID Ready (110Xi4 series)

Better Days Ahead?

I am hearing more positive economic reports almost daily.  Is it possible that the worst is behind us and that better days are ahead?  Here is a sampling of some of this more positive news:

Recession End in Sight. “Modest and fragile” recovery predicted
http://www.inddist.com/article/328954-API_Quarterly_Economic_Forecast_Recession_End_in_Sight.php?nid=3902&rid=5808421

Durable goods orders jump 4.9%  Report indicates modest recovery may be underway
http://www.inddist.com/article/328927-Durable_goods_orders_jump_4_9_.php?nid=3902&rid=5808421

Looking to add color to your world

There has been a great deal of talk over the years regarding the need to have color options for on demand labeling. There have been some new developments in this technology and I am curious if having multiple colors on labels would be helpful to you. If you have an interest in this idea please reply to this blog or give me a call at 952-227-9120.

The UPC Bar Code turns 35

The first use of a UPC bar code took place on June 26, 1974 in a Marsh Supermarket store in Troy, OH when a cashier scanned a package of Wrigley’s gun. With this scan began a period of economic and productivity gains for retailers and manufacturers alike.

Over the years the UPC code has been adopted by other industries looking to take advantage of its benefits. Today UPC codes are scanned more than 10 billion times each day with estimated annual cost savings of $17 billion in the grocery market alone.

Certainly this technology can be considered one of the most productive inventions in history.

RFID is Cool Stuff

Here is a link to an intersting article on how Coke is using RFID technology to improve business intelligence.
http://www.informationweek.com/news/mobility/RFID/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=217701971

Three Steps for Implementing a Barcode Technology Solution

If you have decided to implement a barcode technology solution in your warehouse or distribution center, there are several steps you should follow to do so as quickly and effectively as possible. The first step is to be aware of the effort and time it will take to put a barcode solution in place—and to make your team aware as well. The work will go much more quickly if everybody has realistic expectations.

Next, you’ll need to create a master, computerized list of everything that might be stored in your warehouse or stockroom. At the least, you should include the item number, unit of measure, and description. However, it would also be beneficial to include the purchase cost, vendor, and minimum inventory amount. If you don’t already have a list, ask your suppliers to provide a record of items purchased through them.

Finally, attach barcodes on inventory items and locations. Some products will already have barcodes attached to your supplies. If so, ensure that barcodes on individual items match the item numbers in your master list. Also, you might consider implementing barcode label printers (more on these soon) in your facility, as you’ll still need to create location barcode labels for items that came to you with barcodes.
Creating and attaching barcode labels to items and locations will take time, but know that the work of putting a barcode solution in place will be worth it when the rest of your tasks are simplified afterward.

How barcode technology can simplify inventory management

Accurate and efficient inventory management is among the most important—and challenging—tasks for warehouses and distribution centers of every size. It’s crucial to keep track of finished products/merchandise, works-in-progress, parts, tools, raw materials, etc., and inefficient inventory management systems can cause deep problems that are complicated to amend. Barcode technology is the best and most affordable way to track inventory from receipt to shipment. With barcoding, you can:

• Know what you have and exactly where it is located
• Receive, replace, move, and ship (to internal or external users) all items in inventory.
• Maintain pertinent, up-to-date reports about stock levels, usage, and reorder times for all items in inventory
• Easily import and export data
• Make cycle-counts easy and efficient.
• Easily export data to your accounting or other back-end system

Take Puma, one of the world’s top sporting goods brands, as an example. By switching from paper-based processes to barcode technology, Puma has been able to dramatically increase the efficiency of its central Scandinavian warehouse. The warehouse is approximately 36,000 square feet, holds over 18,000 sports items, and employs about 70 workers over two work shifts. Today, picking of incoming and outgoing deliveries is performed using barcodes and handheld computers synched with a wireless network over a central server. Thanks to the implementation of barcode technology, Puma’s warehouse now performs deliveries at an accuracy level of 99% (http://www.supplychainmarket.com/article.mvc/Right-Item-Right-Place-Right-Recipient-0002?VNETCOOKIE=NO).

Isolate warehouse inefficiencies—and eliminate them—with 360-Degree Review

Even the most streamlined, functional warehouse or distribution center likely struggles with at least one—and up to four—of the eight most common warehouse inefficiencies:

1. Merchandise/inventory defects
2. Transportation
3. Human motion
4. Waiting
5. Inventory
6. Overprocessing
7. Overproduction, and
8. Underutilized skill, as described by Taiichi Ohno, father of the Toyota Production System.

In an article on Food Manufacturing (http://www.foodmanufacturing.com/scripts/Products-Eliminating-Warehouse-Inefficiencies.asp), Michael Giuliano, the President of Meridian Research and Development, LLC, compares warehouse logistical frustrations to amplified versions of preventable incidents, such as misplacing your car keys somewhere in your house. Even if a forklift operator spends only 2.5 minutes searching for an item during one retrieval cycle, that number rises exponentially when multiplied by thousands of retrieval cycles in a week.
Coridian’s 360-Degree Review (http://www.coridian.com/360review.php) is specifically designed to help customers improve their processes from within. The 360-Degree Review begins with an in-depth analysis of a facility’s existing processes, and identifies problems such as waste, downtime, and bottlenecks. Then Coridian provides an evaluation and diagnosis (which may actually differ entirely from the original inefficiency), and designs and implements a solution.
Does your warehouse or distribution center struggle with one—or several—of the eight common warehouse inefficiencies? If so, which ones? What steps have you taken toward improving your processes from within?

Save $700 to $1000 per employee per year with barcode technology

Save $700 to $1000 per employee per year with barcode technology According to government data, the average warehouse in America is just over 17,000 square feet. A warehouse of that size would conservatively employ between 50 and 80 workers. For warehouses that rely on manual inventory methods, however, that may mean a yearly productivity loss worth between $42,500 and $68,000 per year. Barcode technology can help eradicate this loss. The use of barcode technology can be traced back to the 1960s when early implementations were used to identify railway cars. Only 10 years later, common UPC barcodes made their commercial debut on grocery shelves. Barcoding offers optical, machine-readable representations of data, and is ideal for any business in need of accurately tracking merchandise. Depending on specific barcode types, or symbologies, data encoded in barcodes range from only numbers, to numbers and letters, to pictures, files, and other binary data. (We’ll blog more on barcoding symbologies soon.) When scanned, this combination of numbers, letters, and other data identifies the specific object and helps a company keep an accurate record of inventory sold and maintained. The bottom line is that barcoding reduces human error and offers drastically increased productivity from manual methods. Even if an employee spends only 10 minutes a day searching for and gathering misplaced items, he or she loses the equivalent of one full work week—or between $700 to $1,000 per year. For as little as $0.005 each, barcodes are an affordable investment in your warehouse’s productivity.