|
HISTORY
of the UPC Bar Code:
The
history of the UPC bar code and how the bar code symbol and system became
a world standard.
Wallace Flint was the first person to suggest an automated checkout system in
1932. Flint's system was economically unfeasible, however, 40 years later, Flint, as vice-president of the National Association of Food Chains, supported the efforts which led to the Uniform Product Code
(UPC).
Norman Joseph Woodland and Bernard Silver are most often credited as
having originally invented the barcode on October 20, 1949 by filing patent
application serial number 122,416 (which became Patent Number 2,612,994).
Though Woodland and Silver pioneered the concept of a symbol and a reader,
it was not until 1974 that the first UPC bar code was actually used in a
supermarket.
 On
June 26, 1974 at 8:01 am, at a Marsh Supermarket in Troy, Ohio, a 10-pack
of Wrigley's Juicy Fruit was run through a hand-made laser scanner made by
NCR Corp. (then called National Cash Register Co). The register rang up
this sale - 67 cents (according to wrigley.com
see '1974') - marking the first time in history that a UPC was used at
checkout. With that, a new, computerized era in supermarket shopping
began. Since that first pack of gum, (which
just happened to be the first item shopper Clyde Dawson lifted from the
cart at Marsh's Supermarket that day), the black and white UPC bar codes
we see in use everywhere today have helped speed checkout and track the
sales of billions of items at retail establishments everywhere. Also in
1974, National Cash Register Co changed its name to NCR.
George
Laurer is credited as the inventor of the modern UPC bar code system.
It was 1970 when McKinsey & Co. (a consulting firm) in conjunction with
UGPCC (which stood for the Uniform Grocery Product
Code Council, a corporation formed by the grocery industries' leading trade
associations* ) defined a numeric format for product identification. A request was made to many companies to make a proposal of a code, a symbol incorporating the code, and specifications for both. The request went to Singer, National Cash Register,
Litton Industries, RCA, Pitney-Bowes, IBM and many others large and small.
*The UGPCC became the UPCC which became the UCC.
See HISTORY:
Uniform Code Council, Inc.
Most of the other companies had optical codes and scanning equipment in the market place already. IBM did not. Therefore, in 1971
George Laurer was given the task by IBM management to design the best code and symbol suitable for the grocery industry.
In May of 1973, IBM's proposal was accepted. The only changes made by UGPCC was the type font used for the human readable and the ink contrast specification.
Following the acceptance of the original UPC specification, George
Laurer was asked to find a way to add another digit. The symbol already held twelve, the eleven required by UGPCC and a check digit
George Laurer added to achieve the required reliability. The addition of the thirteenth digit could not cause the equipment to require extensive modification. Further, the original domestic version could not be modified.
The extra digit would allow for "country identification" and make the UPC worldwide. Again
George Laurer found a way to accommodate the requirement and the EAN (European Article Numbering system) symbol was born. Many countries are using the same symbol with their identifying country "flag" (the 13th digit), but chose to call the symbol by other names. An example is JAN (Japanese Article Numbering system), the Japanese version. The symbol has truly become worldwide.
In the years since 1973, George Laurer has proposed, and the Uniform Product Code Council, Inc. (formerly UGPCC) has accepted, several other enhancements. Among these enhancements is a price check digit for domestic and another for European markets. There is also an expanded symbol, Version D, which has not yet seen wide use.
 History
of the modern bar code above provided by George Laurer himself. Please be
sure to visit George Laurer's web
Site. Semi-retired, George continues to consult on UPC bar codes on a
freelance basis. George Laurer was inducted into the Innovation
Hall of Fame (IHOF) in May 1991 in recognition of his significant inventions and for creating the standard form of the Universal Product Code.
A 36-year veteran of the International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) who retired in June of 1987, George Laurer is the holder of 25 patents. He is also the author of 20 published Technical Disclosure Bulletins. During his career, IBM recognized and rewarded him for many technical innovations. He received the prestigious “Raleigh, N.C. Inventor of the Year” award in 1976. In 1980 he was honored with IBM’s Corporate Technical Achievement award for his work on the Universal Product Code proposal that was issued in 1970 by McKinsey & Co. and Uniform Grocery Product Code Council, Inc. Before joining IBM, he received the B.S. in electrical engineering form the University of Maryland in 1951. He came to the University after having served in World War II and attending a technical school to learn radio and
TV repair. Upon completion of his first year at the technical school, his instructor convinced him that he should not continue that course of study, but that he should go to college.
If
you need retail packaging design, click
here.
For
all other types of advertising, promotion, business consulting and more,
please click here to our home
page.
Note:
This article is of an editorial nature. All trademarks and copyrights are
owned by their respective owners. If you see errors or omissions, please contact
me so that I may make necessary corrections. I feel the history of the
bar code (as well as the future) is important and created this page since
I found little about this elsewhere. I am doing my best to cross-check and
verify information presented. Thanks - Rob Cummings.
Contact
us or return Home or see Pricing
Bibliography
and sources:
http://www.ecominfo.net/supplychaindata/arts/pearce_history.htm
http://www.fmi.org/careers/fmi_history.htm
http://www.frontlinetoday.com/frontline/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=101942
http://www.psc.com/html/pschistory.htm
http://bellsouthpwp.net/l/a/laurergj/UPC/triviaqu.html
http://www.infowars.com/print/bb/barcodes_common.htm
http://educ.queensu.ca/~compsci/units/encoding/barcodes/history.html
|
