How Many Barcodes Should I Get?

 

It is best practice to get a different barcode for each product or product variation. This is because stores use barcodes for two primary purposes: 1. Barcodes are used for obtaining the price of the product when scanned at the checkout. 2. Barcodes are used for keeping track of stock and deciding when to reorder an item.

This means that if the retailers only use barcodes for option 1, you can get away with having the same barcode for 2 product variations (i.e. different colours of the same product), however if the retailer uses barcodes for option 2 as well, then a different barcode will be required for each product variation.

In general retailers prefer to stock products that will be straight forward to manage. Some retailers may prefer not to stock products if they have to manually count how many are left of each size and reorder accordingly. Therefore is is recommended that you have a different barcode for each variation.

Look here for CD barcodes, DVD barcodes, ISBN book barcodes and ISSN magazine barcodes.