Uses of RFID Technology in the Retail Industry

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RFID (radio frequency identification) has been a part of our world for over a decade. However, several factors are currently pushing this technology forward so that retailers invest in it.

They crave authentic information to optimize business, and RFID can create a brand-new set of information about in-store environments, customer behaviour, and product movement. So, companies not piloting RFID lag in the market, and those using it must develop extra capacities to receive more revenue opportunities.

The following write-up specifies three examples of how RFID can be utilized in the retail industry. Please check it out now.

Store Inventory Procedure and Data Improvement

RFID retail inventory can transform the in-store inventory precision up to 98%, approaching the warehouses easily. The typical inventory process is time-consuming, manual, and conducted at pre-set intervals.

Studies have shown that for every 4% improvement in inventory accuracy, you can certainly expect a 1.5% increase in sales. The typical retailer’s function is 65% accuracy by year-end, leaving enough profits behind.

The handheld RFID systems can locate items in the store using a technique akin to metal detectors, beeping faster when the tag comes close to the item. The more intricate systems having fixed antennas throughout the store can be used to find the item’s location.

Offer Real-Time Data

Data and analytics are one of those areas where eCommerce stores get ahead of physical retails. This mainly happens because everything can be measured. On the contrary, retailers don’t know what’s happening with the stores and customers in any specific detail. Also, the statistics and data they gather are historical and at risk of being outmoded.

But RFID can change all this. The easy and most useful ways of the data enable retailers to leverage the greatest assets largely, their stores and the products. Both analytics and data enable retailers to ensure merchandise is in the right place to be sold.

Detailed information regarding which store is doing well or not is a basic retail KPI, but when it comes to specific item data, RFID produces far more detailed insights. This also entails how precise individual items are in certain stores.

Store Operations

Think about men’s jeans. One style may have at least five different widths, five different lengths, and five different colours. It will be quite impossible to keep a definite inventory amount for the available variations.

Many may go out of stock, and others will have no such movement. This can frequently change with certain trends but not enough to create profound inventory decisions. With RFID, the employees can be informed when a particular combination is no longer found on the floor, where to keep it in the backroom, and exactly how many must be pulled.

Analysing In-store Traffic Patterns

Retailers can use RFID to track the movement of the item throughout the store. The information is very helpful, and retailers can determine the high-traffic end caps in the store and the paths of different employees and products throughout the day.

Contactless Payments

Contactless or touchless payments are transactions completed using a mobile phone, chip-enabled credit, or debit card, or even a key fob. Nowadays, people are also paying through smartphones with NFC payment facilities. Readers are installed near the point-of-sale system in the store.

Self-checkout powered by RFID is faster and more precise than the conventional checkout process. Buyers can make usual shopping, but the items come with a pre-tagged RFID tag. This eliminates the requirement to scan individual barcodes at the point of sale.

As soon as the buyers complete their shopping, they can simply walk through the RFID checkout and verify their identity with the use of biometric scanners. The RFID reader will scan every item in the bag with maximum accuracy. Once the customer is scanned and paid, they can easily walk out of the store. This eliminates the hustle of getting in long queues and waiting for their payment turn.

Checkout

The experts offering the RFID warehouse management solution said it could speed up and eliminate traditional checkouts. The products are passed on a conveyor fixed with scanners that read the information on the products.

They are then tagged to the customer account, thus, creating a frictionless checkout experience where the customer must walk through the RFID gate when exiting the store. Now that is great.

With costs dropping and technologies improving considerably, RFID is gradually gaining a strong footing in the modern-day market. As evident from the above discussion, it can enhance the customer experience, escalate revenues, and contribute to employee trust within the system.

RFID brings substantial swaths of product and customer information, providing the concerned entrepreneur with long-term advantages over their competitors. Contact a well-known supplier and invest as soon as possible. Please let’s know how you plan to use RFID in the retail store below in the comment section.

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