Supply Chain Transparency in the Age of Digital and Physical Convergence

Through good quality data, consumers are provided with the right tools to validate product purchases. When product descriptions, ingredients, nutritionals, or allergens are not transparent, sales and consumer satisfaction can suffer.

Product Availability

After years of slow growth, analysts and experts are predicting grocery e-commerce sales to pick up significantly within the next two years. By anticipating this change, the grocery industry has the opportunity to think holistically about how consumers shop and evaluate how to get the right product into the hands of the consumer fast and efficiently.

Originally implemented in the grocery industry for efficient checkout purposes, GS1 Standards—including the UPC barcode—are now being leveraged to meet various supply chain visibility needs across all retail categories. The foundation GS1 Standards provide consists of three layers: the standardized identification for products and locations, standardized data carriers (like barcodes) that capture essential product information, and standardized data exchange to share through an electronic network. Each layer plays an important role in efficiently moving a product from the source to the consumer.

To reap the benefits of standardization, the industry must have uniform adoption. GS1 Standards drive automatic data capture so that companies can share information about a product as it moves through the supply chain. Applying a barcode that contains a Global Trade Item Number (GTIN) allows for more consistent information and the ability to track and trace a product—which is particularly helpful in the event of a recall, or if the quality of a product has come into question.

Once products have been identified with GTINs and barcodes for global uniqueness, electronic commerce can be achieved. With the exchange of standardized product information, it becomes possible to move away from sending faxes and paper copies for orders, invoices, or advance shipping notices. Business transactions become seamless, especially with the ability to link internal systems to an external system all trading partners can utilize. Standards lead not only to improved data for the consumer, but also help retailers improve inventory management to meet multi-channel consumer requests and decrease out-of-stocks.

Product Images

Images now play an increasingly significant role in purchasing decisions, and suppliers see this as a big opportunity to create a more engaging online experience. However, product images can be a shortcoming when consumers are regularly frustrated with inconsistent or unclear product photos.

Sharing images between trading partners can be challenging due to conflicting requirements among partners. To reduce inefficiencies and provide consumers with much needed product image consistency, GS1 US brought industry stakeholders and experts together to develop recommendations for standardizing retail grocery digital product images.

The guideline, titled “Product Images Application Guideline for the Retail Grocery Industry,” is a resource for standardizing image capture, naming, and sharing across multiple platforms. It provides general best practices, a style guide, and instructions for publishing images in the Global Data Synchronization Network (GDSN), a central repository of continuously updated product information. Industry stakeholders are now provided with collective definitions, business process standards, real-world examples of use, and step-by-step guidance on image preparation for upload to the GDSN.

For example, the guideline’s style guide shares best practices for consistently featuring a product’s front, left, right, back, top, and bottom image angles. It also provides improper usage examples, such as super-imposed images, watermarked images and improperly cropped images. Categories covered in the guidelines include meat, poultry, seafood, produce, and more.

Product Authentication

An additional benefit of using GS1 Standards in the new age of digital and physical convergence is the verification that a product truly is what it says it is, particularly when the consumer may be aware of past food fraud cases involving fish, olive oil, milk, and pet food.