Sports Equipment Maker Answers Compliance Labeling Demand

Like any supplier that sells to the retail industry, compliance labeling is a must for Hillerich & Bradsby Co., maker of Louisville Slugger baseball bats and PowerBilt golf and Louisville Hockey equipment. Each product must be labeled with specific customer UPC (universal product code) bar codes; however, it is also vital for shipping carriers to have their unique Maxicode (a type of bar code) on the Louisville Slugger packages. "Louisville Slugger designed a mobile, RF [radio frequency] system to add efficiency to the picking process and to streamline compliance labeling and carrier labeling," said Thomas Comey, president of Walker Technologies (Cincinnati), the Datamax (Orlando, FL) dealer that engineered the mobile system.

Louisville Slugger initially selected the Datamax E-4203 label printer for a beta test at the Louisville location in conjunction with a battery-powered computer cart that supports the printer and an RF Glacier computer with a touch screen monitor. The cart hooks up to a stock cart for product picking and labeling. The Datamax I-4208 eventually was integrated into Louisville Slugger's existing shipping system at its largest distribution center in California for compliance labeling and shipping labels. "The I-Class was selected for durability and high-volume printing," says Comey. The aluminum-framed I-4208 has a 32-bit processor and 8 MB of addressable RAM (random access memory) and provides first label throughput at 8 ips (inches per second).