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How to Get Started with  Bar Code Labels


Bar code Labels
by Phyllis Davis-Minik

Business Women Digital-Women

I receive many calls and emails each week form people asking "what do I do, my  customer just called and told me I have to print bar code labels".  You don't know where to  begin, so you search the internet to find the answers. You work fast because the customer  wants the labels starting next month. In this article I will show you some simple steps to  finding a solution for your company. 

 First you need to find out what type of labels your customer is requesting. The most common  labels are UPC labels. These are the labels you find at the grocery store and at retail stores  on products like kleenex, and canned goods. UPC labels can even be found on large items like  lawn mowers. If this is what your customer asked for, then you will need to place a UPC bar  code on each product you ship your customer. Here are the steps for UPC label printing: 

 1 - Contact the Uniform Code Council (UCC) at (800) 543-8137 to obtain a manufacturer  identification number. 

 2 - Decide if you should have a printer print your bar code labels or if you want to handle  printing the labels yourself.  You will want to consider the volume of labels you require for  your products. If you need a large volume of labels and very few products it will be best to  go to the printer to have the labels created. If you have a small volume of products or  multiple products you may want to try to do it yourself. 

 3 - If you decide to print the labels yourself there are several ways to create the labels. If  you have your products in your computer already, then find out from your software provider if  you can print bar code labels from your software. You will need to find out what printers are  compatible with the software. Sometimes you can print the labels out on a laser or ink jet  printer, but other software requires a barcode printer. If you can print from your software,  you are in luck, there will not be much expense involved. No data entry, no additional  software, and maybe no hardware! 

 If you do not have your items in an inventory software package or your software company does  not have the print bar code label feature then you will have to buy a stand alone PC based  label software program. The programs are available from $50.00 - $1,000. There are many to  choose from. I suggest you visit  http://www.adams1.com/pub/russadam/share.html There are some  software programs available for downloading at this site. 

 When you choose your software be thinking about how you want to print the labels. You could  print the labels on a special bar code printer which costs $500.00 - $5,000 to purchase. The  reason you may want to purchase a special bar code printer is you may find yourself buying  expensive print cartridges much more often than you want to. Printing a label on a deskjet or  inkjet takes more ink than most other documents you print. 

 If your customer asked for shipping labels this will complicate matters. You will need to go  through step 3 outlined above. The shipping label contains information about the products in a  shipment. For example if you had 2 of product 123 and 3 of product 567 your customer will want  the information printed on the label and placed on the outside of the container. What makes  the shipping labels more difficult is that every customer requests a different label format. 

 Advanced EDI & Barcoding Corp 

 Phyllis Davis-Minik, president of Advanced EDI & Barcoding Corp has been in the Information  Technology field since 1981, specializing in EDI, inventory management and bar-coding Before  Phyllis started Advanced EDI & Barcoding Corp she was employed by International Paper for  around 6 years as a programmer analyst and project coordinator.  Phyllis is a member of TAPPI  ,  GCA, APICS and the AFPA EDI committee. Advanced EDI & Barcoding Corp has been in business since 1994. The company is located in Pensacola, Florida.


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