Page 25 - Logistics News - May 2021

B A R C ODE S

A history of barcodes

and looking ahead

By Gabe Grifoni, Founder and CEO of Rufus Labs

Barcodes have been completing transactions and making inventory organisation a breeze since the 1970s.

little over 50 years ago (31 March, 1971), leaders information to Joe Woodland, another Drexel grad student
from the biggest names in commerce came and established inventor, who was immediately captivated.
tog
A ether and transformed the global economy
forever by developing the Global Trade Item Number Woodland was so intrigued by solving this pervasive
(GTIN). This numerical code uniquely identifies every retail problem that he pressed pause on grad studies
single product and is the core of the barcode, the most and relocated to Miami to work on a plan that would
important supply chain standard in history. Today, the revolutionise the grocery store experience. The idea for the
barcode is scanned over six billion times every day and first barcode came as Woodland sat on the beach drawing
remains one of the most trusted symbols in the world. lines in the sand, which reminded him of the dots and
dashes that exist in Morse code.
History of the barcode
Before the barcode was introduced, managing inventory Woodland applied the same general idea of Morse code
from label to self to checkout was time consuming and to those sand drawings. Ultimately, he figured out that
manual. Not only was this process inefficient, but there was he could develop a vast number of codes by changing the
also plenty of room for human error. line sizes through increasing or decreasing their width. He
returned to Philadelphia and with the help of Silver the two
The origin story of the barcode starts in Philadelphia developed a prototype system and filed a patent for the
at a grocery store. Its manager had become so frustrated technology in 1949.
with the slow checkout process that he contacted a dean at
Drexel Institute of Technology in Philadelphia, desperate Unfortunately, the first prototype that would actually
for a solution. Bernard Silver, a graduate student at the read the barcodes failed because the internal light, a 500-
time, had overheard the conversation and relayed the watt incandescent lightbulb, was not bright enough and

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