News

Metro Group, the German retailer, has announced a further rollout of pallet-level RFID with supplier Checkpoint Systems.

Checkpoint is to provide the firm with RFID portals for 200 Real hypermarkets during 2008. This follows last year's deployment of portals at more than 100 Real hypermarkets.

Metro will initially use the portals to track pallets as they arrive in-store, but will later employ them in case-level tracking.

Metro Group has used RFID technology since 2004.

Last year, at its flagship Galeria Kaufhof store in Essen, the retailer showcased item-level RFID, including 'smart mirrors' that provided customers with information on complementary products, and 'smart shelves' that showed what products were on the rack.

The RFID system also controlled the reception of in-bound goods and a real-time inventory management system.

Checkpoint supplied system integration services to Metro Group in 2007 and also supplied RFID labels for the retailer's Tag It Easy pilot project to assist Asian suppliers with compliance.