Acosta’s Mobile Solution Speeds Time-to-Shelf for Candymaker Just Born
Zebra Printer Helps Cut In-Store Time and Get Inventory on Its Way
About Acosta Sales & Marketing
Founded in 1927, Acosta has grown from a local food broker to become the leading outsourced sales and marketing agency serving consumer packaged goods companies and retailers across the United States and Canada. The company’s integrated approach engages shoppers at every point along the path to purchase and ensures that clients’ products are strategically positioned to most effectively convert shoppers at the shelf.
Challenge
You may not know the name Just Born, but you likely know their candy. The national confectionary company makes names such as Mike and Ike’s, Hot Tamales and marshmallow Peeps.
A couple of years ago, the company recognized an untapped opportunity—to get its candies into more convenience stores. Just Born turned to Acosta, which brings technology, expertise and connections with tens of thousands of stores nationwide, including an attractive segment of 30,000 independent convenience stores.
Once in stores, Acosta must help keep Just Born’s regular and seasonal candies on shelves. When Acosta reps check inventory at stores, they need a quick and simple way to print shelf tags and UPC-coded reorder lists for store managers.
HID Global Introduces FARGO DTC1000M Monochrome Printer/Encoder
HID Global, trusted leader in solutions for the delivery of secure identity, today announced the expansion of its Genuine HID card printer and encoder portfolio with the launch of its new FARGO DTC1000M Monochrome Printer/Encoder. The DTC1000M delivers FARGO quality, reliability and ease of use, while providing organizations with a solution that is cost-effective to own and operate and offers a low total cost of ownership.
Maximizing the Image Life of Direct Thermal Receipts and Wristbands
Direct thermal printing dates back to the 1960s and was originally designed for copiers and fax machines that utilize chemically coated paper. It has since been transformed into a highly successful print technology for bar coding.
Direct thermal media is essentially a self-contained printing system. It is manufactured by applying surface coatings to the media with a chemical formula that includes colorless dyes and developers. When the media goes through a thermal printer, heat (thermal energy) from the thermal printhead causes the dye and developer to activate and form a high-definition image. The thermal printhead consists of many heating elements distributed along its printing width. Each element is electronically controlled to deliver the correct amount of energy to an exact location for an exact amount of time. Those individual elements are strobed by the printer to form the final image—text, graphics, and bar codes. Fully saturating or imaging direct thermal chemistry is key to obtaining the most durable direct thermal image. Producing a less than fully saturated image will reduce the image life when exposed to various contaminants or environmental conditions.
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Thibodaux Regional Medical Center Enforces Bedside Medication Verification with Wristband Solution
Durable, Flexible Bands Prevent Workarounds and Contribute to High Scan Rates
About Thibodaux Regional Medical Center
In Thibodaux, La., Thibodaux Regional Medical Center, a 185-bed acute care facility, provides inpatient and outpatient care for the people of Lafourche and seven surrounding parishes. For the third consecutive year, J.D. Power and Associates recognized the center for service excellence under the Distinguished Hospital Program, acknowledging Thibodaux Regional’s strong commitment to provide “An Outstanding Patient Experience” for inpatient and outpatient services.
Challenge
To achieve and maintain its award-winning reputation, Thibodaux has progressed on several key initiatives in recent years. The medical center has increasingly moved toward a more paperless environment and brought in bedside medication verification (BMV).
With those strides, the hospital knew it needed to upgrade its approach to patient wristbands as well. Paper labels created paper waste, and didn’t hold up well in the hospital environment.
McAllen Police Department Reduces Dismissed Tickets by Half
E-Citation Produces More Legible Tickets, Increases Revenue
About McAllen Police Department
The McAllen Police Department (MPD) serves the McAllen, Texas, metro area, with a population of about 130,000. Just five miles from the U.S.-Mexico border and the Mexican city of Reynosa (with a population of 500,000), the city’s size can grow by 200,000 to 300,000 commuters each day. The MPD employs 272 sworn officers and approximately 380 total employees.
Challenge
Like many police departments, MPD had long issued hand-written paper tickets to offenders. The manual process left room for errors in two places:
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- Point of issuance—Handwritten ticket information could be incorrect or illegible.
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- Municipal court—Administrators occasionally entered dates, locations, license numbers, or license plates incorrectly.
Smart ID Cards for Education
Secure the Campus While Providing Essential Services
From universities to primary schools, a revolution in technology is taking shape. The days when mundane tasks such as registration, book purchases, and meal programs required an army of administrators to manage piles of paperwork is but a digital page in today’s history e-books. Twenty-first-century innovation is bringing automation— and a chance to improve security—to the campus.
With education costs skyrocketing, departments at all levels are looking for ways to do more with less—trimming expenses while maximizing staff productivity. Add the looming threats to campus security, and educators must make decisions that balance quality of education with protecting our students. In fact, the 2011 Campus Safety magazine’s “How Safe Is Your Campus?” report revealed that 52 percent of faculty said their institutions fail to dedicate sufficient resources to campus safety and security.
The simple answer relies on the same technology that corporations use—secure smart ID cards. Embedded with “smart” features such as radio frequency identification (RFID) and tamper-resistant laminates, education campuses can realize a wide range of benefits, from tightening security, to streamlining admission, to improving paid services. Read on to find out how you can benefit from smart cards, and learn how your school district can do more with less.
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Schenck Company Invests in Durability for Demanding Delivery Environment
Beer Distributor Chooses Zebra RW 420 for Proven Ruggedness
About Schenck Company
Since 1954, Schenck Company has provided beverages to the Central Florida region, which includes Orlando and coastal resort towns. From just six employees, the company has grown to 600 associates and serves 6,000 customers. Now within the top 20 beer distributors in the country, the full-service distributor represents MillerCoors, Crown Imports, Heineken USA, Diageo-Guinness, Boston Beer and other domestic, import and craft breweries. A commitment to its employees and customers has helped land Schenck among Florida’s top 100 privately-held companies.
Challenge
Every day, 90 Schenck delivery drivers bring hundreds of cases to retailers. With each stop, they verify orders, capture the customer’s signature electronically and print a receipt.
For several years, the company has relied on a combination of handheld devices and mobile printers; however, the demanding delivery environment quickly wears down the electronics.
Tips for RFID Smart Label Printing/Encoding
Zebra Technologies introduced the first integrated, on-demand radio frequency identification (RFID) smart label printer/encoder in 2001, and since then we have worked with hundreds of customers around the world who use different RFID protocols, frequencies, inlay designs, and standards. This experience has taught us several best practices that are applicable to any smart label printing operation.
Accurate RFID encoding is critical to every deployment. If the printer/encoder does not perform the tag data and item association correctly, the errors can propagate throughout the entire supply chain. Following the tips described in this white paper can help you get more from your smart label printing system by improving reliability, minimizing operator intervention, reducing wasted labels, preventing encoding and printing errors, and yielding more usable labels per media roll.
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Blood Bag Labeling
Industry Need
With nearly 5 million Americans requiring blood transfusions annually, there is a tremendous need for blood products to supply these important therapies. Blood banks and collection centers require robust labels to reliably track blood from the donor to the final recipient; these labels need to survive multiple processing, testing, and storage steps through challenging environmental conditions. Intermec’s blood bag labeling product set enables durable, positive tracking of these critical components.
Bar coded blood bag labels enable the high degree of accuracy required for successful transfusion therapy. Clearly identified blood typing prevents serious complications that could result from donor type incompatibility. Different blood components and storage conditions yield varying shelf life; clear expiration date identification guarantees patients receive only safe, effective products. Formats configured in compliance with ISBT-128 standards provide interoperability with multiple collection centers, processing locations, and hospital systems.
In order for essential data to follow the contents of the blood bag, labels must endure a series of challenging conditions. Labels must maintain a strong bond to the flexible blood bag during centrifugation while whole blood is separated into components. Labels must remain positively attached during standard or cryogenic freezing (plasma and some red cells), refrigeration (red cells), or continuous shaking at room temperature (platelets). The bond must then be maintained during warming, which often includes immersion in a water bath.
Beyond the physical performance needs, blood bag labels must also meet regulatory requirements. The United States Food and Drug Administration mandates compliance with 21 CFR175.105 to increase safety should components of the adhesive migrate through the plastic into the blood bag.
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Adopting Bar Code Labeling in Hospital Pharmacies
One of the most proven and effective methods to prevent medical errors is to use bar coding to identify medications at the unit-dose level for dispensing and administration. By taking action to ensure all medications used in the hospital include a bar code, pharmacists can set a strong foundation for patient safety initiatives and align their organization with patient safety goals established by The Joint Commission and the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP).
This white paper will illustrate how bar code systems improve patient safety; summarize the ASHP, The Joint Commission, and FDA policies and recommendations that are driving the current surge in bar code-based patient safety programs; present bar code marking options for pharmacists; and provide guidance for developing a practical strategy for bar code-based patient safety programs.
