Barcode labellers provide major benefits for a variety of applications. Whether you’re a warehouse operator looking to provide asset tagging for a high volume of products or an e-commerce business owner seeking to organise your home office inventory, barcodes offer versatile inventory management solutions.
This article will explore how deploying thermal printers, scanners and labellers can streamline your business processes by storing a wealth of critical data at your fingertips.
How to use barcodes to streamline your workflow
Deploying a barcode labelling solution can make your inventory management systems more efficient, regardless of the setting. Let’s take a look at how this technology can positively impact workflows across a variety of industries:
Remote work
The connectivity provided by modern smart devices has enabled many small business owners to reach a global consumer base from the comfort of their living room. Running a company from home can be challenging, but today’s inventory management systems provide operators with transparency and traceability for their products as they’re shipped to customers.
Apps like Brother iPrint&Label offer the ability to create your own barcodes, so that your products can be tracked with a single scan. Desktop labellers like the P-Touch Cube PT-P710BT can connect with mobile devices to print your customised barcodes, bringing the efficiency of large-scale warehouse operations to your home business.
Software applications like the P-touch Editor also allow you to format your labels and connect to databases in order to print your barcodes from home.
Office
Eliminating the need for manual data entry can greatly improve the efficiency of your office workflows. Today’s barcode technology provides your business with simple scan-and-go automation for a variety of tasks.
Barcode scanners make an error 1 in every 36 trillion characters, as opposed to even the most efficient manual data entry systems, where the average is closer to 1 in 300 characters.
What’s more, your personnel will no longer have to rifle through huge file cabinets to search for necessary documents – a barcode solution allows for document retrieval and inventory management with a single scan.
Warehouse
Barcodes are deployed in the warehouse for a number of efficiency-enhancing reasons. From product tracking to inventory management, operators depend on the versatility of labelling solutions to maintain visibility across the supply chain.
Devices like the Titan TJ-4522TN Industrial Label Printer can print up to 10,000 barcode labels per day, providing durable asset tracking for any volume of goods before they’re shipped to consumers around the world.
With a single scan from anywhere across the supply chain, connected inventory management systems can track products, outgoing shipments and equipment. Applications like the b-Pac Software Development Kit (SDK) ensure the compatibility of barcode label printers with existing software architecture.
How barcode labels impact retail inventory management and food labelling
Retail
Retailers depend on speed and efficiency in order to provide their customers with up-to-date pricing and inventory information. By equipping your workforce with mobile printing solutions like the RJ-3250WB, they’ll be able to generate barcode labels right in store aisles.
This allows your staff to update on-shelf pricing for multiple products at once, simply by changing the barcode on a product’s shelving or signage. The days of manually updating barcodes for each individual item are gone, resulting in less time spent updating the inventory throughout the store.
Barcodes enable faster transactions, ensure less downtime, and can facilitate increased sales and a more rapid turnover of goods. Today’s QR code technology allows your customers to scan codes right from their mobile devices as they shop, providing them with discount or product information that results in increased customer satisfaction.
As reported by 9News Australia, retailers like Aldi are even utilising barcode technology to offer checkout-less shopping for consumers. With a scan from their smartphones, shoppers are able to directly purchase goods as the peruse store aisles – an application that could provide cost savings by way of reducing staff necessary to man checkouts in the future.
Food labelling
Barcodes allow producers to store important information digitally in order to maintain the visibility that is crucial to the lifespan of their goods as they’re shipped and stocked on grocery shelves. The grab-and-go efficiency of barcode and QR code labels allows instant tracking of expiration dates and delivery schedules.
Grocers can scan barcodes or QR labels to gain insight on the creation and packaging dates of perishable goods.
For food producers, handheld labellers like the QL 700 produce highly legible, long-lasting labels detailing all necessary information – from ingredients and allergens to use-by dates and prices.
There’s no need for ink or toners, so you can keep costs low, and reduce wastage by using the same roll for multiple label designs.
Brother barcode apps and devices
Connected Brother applications ensure your devices can integrate with inventory management systems for a streamlined deployment.
The Brother Pro Label Tool App allows QR and barcode management by offering the ability to import a database. Connectivity with industrial printers allows the creation of high-volume barcode labels, while wristband & label printers can handle barcoding for event management or healthcare uses.
Compatibility with applications like BarTender by Seagull Scientific provides Brother barcode devices the ability to automate label creation. This saves your business time by offering tools to manage and integrate label and document printing within your connected business systems.
From sole proprietorships to multi-national logistics operations, today’s business leaders depend on Brother barcode solutions to get the job done.
Regardless of your operational needs, Brother offers barcode and labelling systems designed to save the time, energy and costs associated with outdated manual inventory management systems. To learn more about how deploying a connected device and software solution can maximise your operational efficiency, contact Brother for a complimentary print assessment today.
