How the RFID mandates can impact peak season and how you can prepare.

As more companies implement and utilize RFID technology to adapt to the consistent rise in customer demands, it’s important that warehouses follow. More stores like Walmart and Nordstrom are mandating RFID technology for suppliers to induce RFID tags on all products provided to stores. This is happening right now, but Walmart is requiring supplies to include RFID tags on all products by Fall 2022. These companies are implementing RFID technology to manage store products because it helps prepare for stockouts and rising customer expectations during peak season.

Not surprisingly, RFID surpasses customer expectations and prepares for demands as it brings inventory accuracy to 99.9% and instills real-time visibility. This especially helps during peak season, when customers even more furiously demand same-day shipping, yet a more accurate inventory. Furthermore, studies show that 80% of shoppers want same-day shipping, while 61% want their packages even faster. Speeding up warehouse workflows makes it more challenging to maintain accuracy, but that’s where RFID, which is now less costly, is the solution to those issues. It’s estimated that the price of a UHF RFID tag has dropped by 80% in the last decade and even the price of RFID readers has dropped by 50%. Because holiday sales have been responsible for up to 30% of a retailer’s annual sales, striving for dependable accuracy and compliance must take place before the peak season begins –generally after Halloween but earlier for many specialty stores. Therefore, without RFID technology that achieves faster and more accurate shipping, warehouses could be left unequipped to handle the shifting demands during peak season and lose out on a huge portion of annual revenue. Implementing reliable tracking solutions like RFID could be the difference between a massive success this year or a piercing loss.

Using RFID technology helps reduce out-of-stocks while tracking customer demand patterns over time, which helps create swifter reaction times during peak seasons. Better insight into inventory availability, real-time inventory tracking, faster fulfillment processing times, and more accurate real-time data analytics all come from RFID, which has now become indispensable to help stores and warehouses meet demands. Simply put, to reap the 99.9% accuracy and maintain an accurate inventory, RFID has now become indispensable.

The key is getting started early.

While RFID technology significantly optimizes warehouse operations to increase inventory accuracy and make fulfillment times faster, it cannot be deployed overnight. To remain ahead of mandates and surges in demands, experts agree that it’s best to begin planning your RFID solution well in advance. To begin this process, solution designers recommend focusing on five basic pillars to scalable modernized tracking:

1. Ensure a tech support system to assist through piloting - Tracking assets and materials is a challenge that can cost businesses thousands of dollars and time. To simplify setup, a dependable tech support team can help expand solution visibility and tracking, thus eliminating blind spots in the setup process. It’s also important to have a team close by during the piloting phrase to make tweaks as needed. That’s why Heartland’s AlwaysOn services offer a fast and reliable way to track assets and manage your devices. without having to count each item individually. A faster and more reliable asset tracking solution helps enhance fulfillment during peak season.
   
2. Enhance mobile device management - By choosing Heartland’s RFID systems and AlwaysOn managed services, workers can verify device usage and placement, ensuring equipment is properly stored at the end of every shift to avoid breakdowns and misplacements. Greater device availability secures the higher accuracy and faster shipments that your business needs to optimize workflows during peak season.
   
3. Maximize data accuracy and visibility - When data is being collected and uploaded electronically, businesses avoid errors, duplication of data, and lost inventory, resulting in fewer out-of-stocks and overstocking. Modernized mobile and handheld RFID readers are now designed for fast-paced distribution processes and can help you gain instant visibility into your operations by connecting to your centralized database for instant count updates.
   
4. Integrate faster connectivity with real-time visibility - Working within a reliable connectivity network, RFID data capture and mobile computing work together in providing real-time accurate data to multiple teams for faster response times. For example, updated counts and locations can accelerate order picking for quicker curbside service and more completed orders.
   
5. Minimize downtime by consolidating workflows - Choosing RFID applications can automatically track the flow of goods and upload the information to your system. Therefore, they can remove the need for manual form filling and replace outdated spreadsheets. Heartland’s printing solutions and RFID readers help reduce labor costs, downtime, return shipment costs, and chargebacks to make your business more accurate and efficient during peak season.

As more businesses mandate RFID technology, warehouses preparing for rising customer demands and peak season are forced to also choose the revolutionary asset tracking solution. Learn how you can empower faster and more accurate shipments.