When it comes to product attributes, wine is a particular tricky commodity. When examining a single wine, there are many factors that consumers may want to know before making a purchase. Most recently, one of these attributes--vintage--has been the center of a lot of scrutiny. This past May, California-based retail juggernaut BevMo! was served a class-action lawsuit for advertising in-store and online (mostly on wines under $25) vintages that didn’t match the products they

The quest for a unique wine item number for use throughout the industry has been a recurring theme in this column. So much so that I was invited to sit on a panel at the Wine Industry Technology Symposium to present the retailer perspective in a discussion of what the 3 tiers could do better to share product information. The assumption of the discussion was that the UPC code or more correctly GTINs (Global Trade Item Numbers) are the de facto codes for the industry when it co

In the early 1980's Walmart famously introduced barcode scanners in their stores to speed up the checkout process. Back then only 45% of their most successful products carried UPC codes. After successful tests with this new technology Walmart leveraged their market clout to require all their distributors and suppliers to supply UPC codes with their products. Before long everyone who touched the Walmart ecosystem including their competitors had adopted UPC codes and we entered