History of Bar Coding

Bar Coding is an automatic identification (Auto ID) technology that streamlines identification and data collection.


With some of its first concepts developed in the mid 1930s, bar coding has since grown into a $3.3-billion worldwide, multi-industry technology that is forecasted to grow annually by as much as 20% through the end of the century.

Let's take a look at the history.

Early Roots

Bar coding’s early roots in the 1940s seriously expanded to the retail marketplace in the late 1960s, with efforts to develop a standard for automating supermarket point-of-sale. 

Bar Code Invented in 1948

The first barcode, with a design like a bullseye, was invented by two Drexel University students named Norman J Woodland and Bernard Silver. They were tackling the supermarket's problems of tracking inventoryy and custoomer checkout. 

Early Industrial Applications

The early industrial applications of bar coding can be traced back to the early 1960s, where Westinghouse Air Brake filed a patent describing a bar code attached to a railroad car, known as KarTrak or KarTrak ACI.

Bulls-eye-symbol & scanner

By 1972, RCA developed a bull’s-eye symbol and scanner that operated in a Kroger store in Cincinnati, Ohio. 

UPC Symbol Adoption

Revisions and developments gathered from this initial test site led to the development and adoption of the UPC (Universal Product Code) symbol. This became the industry standard for grocery stores in the United States on April 3, 1973. 

By 1974...

The first UPC was scanned in Troy Ohio on a pack of Wrigley's gum at 8 a.m. on June 26, 1974.  By this time, 95% of all U.S. freight cars had been labeled with retroreflective bar code symbols before the poorly performing system was abandoned due to insufficient training, maintenance and equipment investments. (image courtesy of National Museum of American History)

During the 1970s

Bar coding became increasingly practical and economical with the advent of low- cost electronics (microprocessors) and lower cost lasers. While numerous companies devised their own bar code symbologies and scanning equipment, the stability of the UPC system gave rise to industrial acceptance and the need for standardization. 

Early 1980s

In the early 1980s, standardization activities of bar code symbologies and specifications took place with Military Standard 11 89 for Code 39. Other standards such as ANSI Standard MHl 0.8M, UPC Shipping Container standards, and Automotive Industry Action Group (AIAG) standards soon followed suit, as did specifications from other industries such as paper, aluminum, electronics, telecommunications, and furniture development.

Late 1980s

Brought achievements in other sumboloogy developoments, which reduced the space required by bar codes while increasing their data capacity. Bar Codes saw widespread adoption beyond grocery stores, expanding into industries like electronics, textiles, and the Defense Department, while 2D barcodes emerged to handle more complex data.

1990s

Multi-row, high capacity, two-dimensional symbologies such as PDF417 and Code One were developed.

Modern Day

Numerous bar code symbologies have been developed throughout the woorld. 

The evolution of bar coding standards brought with it the need for greater precision, technical refinement and uniformity.

Responding to this need, the trade organization of Automatic Identification Manufacturers (AIM) developed Uniform Symbol Specifications (USS) for numerous bar code symbologies which have standardized the technology throughout the world. Bar code technology is the cornerstone of the Auto ID industry, but it does not work alone.


The combination of bar coding with the appropriate computer hardware, application software, training and utilization create the potential for improved performance, productivity and profitability in virtually any industry.

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