The use of bar coding has been growing dramatically over the last 20 years. With the adoption of UPC as the standard for retail grocery stores in the late 70's, bar codes have become an everyday experience for most people. Bar codes are a fast, easy, and accurate data entry method. The correct use of bar codes can decrease employee time required and increase an organization's efficiency.

There are many bar code label software programs available. There are two main types of bar-code label software. The first generates a unique barcode and prints it on a label that can be attached to your inventory item. The second type of barcode label software lets you determine the exact barcode to print.

Many bar-code label software programs will work with a standard printer, however, some require a special thermal barcode printing device.

There are many benefits to using bar codes in your business. If you carry an inventory of products, using bar codes with a software program will allow you to easily create reports of what you have in stock. Many programs will allow you to set up alerts, so you'll always know when you are running low on a product before you are out of that item completely. Using bar code label software to create barcodes for your products also makes it easy to update an online shopping site, since you can use a database to store your inventory and feed that information directly into your shopping cart on your website. Sales become quick and easy for retail establishments using bar-code label software. A quick scan of the barcode with a code reader, and the point of sale (register) system can give a total price while updating inventory levels at the same time. In some cases, you can even set your program up to automatically order products from suppliers as they are purchased or reach specific levels.

Bar code label software increases the efficiency of a business. Instead of manually counting your products and keeping track of purchases for inventory, you can scan the items with a hand held device and know instantly how many you have, and how many you need. Ringing a customer's order up is as easy as scanning their bar codes into the computer. Tax and a total price is calculated based on the information stored with a barcode.

Price changes become effortless. You can change the price of a product by updating the price information in the database of products your barcode label software contains. Rather than having to manually change the price of each item in your inventory, you can adjust the price of all items with the same barcode one time.

Bar code label software has made it affordable and easy for a small business owner to implement barcodes in their business. Barcodes have increased the efficiency of businesses that carry an inventory of products.