Why Have a Barcode?

Back in earlier times books were marked with a simple price tag on the cover. But if you look around a bookstore now, you’ll likely notice that nearly all the books have a barcode on the back cover; why is this necessary?

Although it is not law that you have a barcode on your retail product or publication, it is often required by re-sellers and distributors. They use the barcode to efficiently keep active inventories and sales records. Most retailers will no longer carry your book unless it has a barcode.

So how do barcodes work?
There are lots of types of barcode, but the common one we all see all the time is called UPC, the Universal Product Code.

Each digit is coded by two black and two white stripes. The stripes have widths of from 1 to 4 units, and the total width for each digit is always seven units.
This code is not quite all there is to it, however. Some digits of the barcode are reversed, so that they read right to left. Part of the code has black and white inverted, so black stripes are white and vice versa. This helps cut down errors and allows a computer to work out if the code was read from the wrong end when it was scanned.

The barcode is made up of 12 digits, in various groups. The first two show the country that issued the barcode. The next four digits indicate the manufacturer. Some countries have a three digit country code, so they only have three digits for the manufacturer code.

Example:
00-13 USA & Canada
20-29 reserved for local use (store/warehouse)
30 -37 France
400-440 Germany
45 Japan

There are some quirks in the system. Often books, which have the code 978, actually start the code with 78, so that there are enough digits left in the code to add the complete international book number. Sometimes the missing nine is simply printed in front of the code.

Most small manufacturers or self-publishers are pursuing barcodes to meet some requirement of a re-seller or distributor. This requirement should be specified by those re-sellers and distributors, and may differ from one to the next. There are industry standards, which are most often the requirements. Always check with your re-seller or distributor to make sure you meet their specifications.

Typically, after you obtain the ISBN for your book, you will have the ingredients to create your own barcode. Create a barcode yourself at Bar Codes Inc.
Learn more about barcodes at Bowker.

Article references:
http://www.morethanyouthink.com/shopping/barcodeswork.html
http://www.mecsw.com/info/UPC_FAQ.html

A Quick Guide to ISBNs for Self-Publishers

By Jennifer Tribe

ISBN stands for International Standard Book Number. It is a code assigned to every published book that uniquely identifies it in the marketplace. ISBNs make it easier and more efficient for libraries, booksellers and others in the publishing industry to order, distribute and catalog books.

When To Use an ISBN:

You need to assign an ISBN to any content you intend to distribute through outside channels such as bookstores, catalogues or libraries. ISBNs should be placed on

-- print books

-- electronic books

-- videos

-- audio cassettes and CDs

-- CD-ROMs, and

-- other items as detailed by the International ISBN Agency.

You need to issue a separate ISBN for each edition of your book and for every format. For example, if you issued the same book as a print book, e-book, audio book and Braille book, you would require a separate identifier for each. If one year later, you updated the manuscript and re-issued the book, you would assign new ISBNs to this second edition in each of its different formats.

Deciphering the Numbering System

All ISBNs are currently 10 digits. (The industry will slowly be transitioning to a 13-digit system starting in 2005. See ISBN for more information on the change.)

The digits identify:

-- the group (country, area or language area of the publisher)

-- the publisher, and

-- the title of the item.

The last digit is a check digit.

The group number is comprised of one to three digits. Zero is the number for the English language group that includes the United States, English-speaking Canada, the U.K., Australia and other countries.

The publisher number is comprised of two to seven digits. The more ISBNs a publisher uses, the small their publisher number.

Publishers that use more than 100,000 ISBNs are given a publisher number of only two digits. If you apply for 10 or fewer ISBNs, you will be assigned a publisher number with seven digits. Everyone else falls somewhere in the middle.

Thus anyone in the book trade can look at an ISBN and know roughly how big you are as a publisher by the number of ISBNs you have applied to use. This is why self-publishing gurus like Dan Poynter recommend acquiring your ISBNs in blocks of 100 to avoid being labeled “small potatoes.”

Poynter further recommends that you use an ISBN from the middle of your list of 100 for your first book, since a 0 or 1 as your title number will reveal you as a first-timer.

The check digits range from one to 10. Since there is space for only one check digit, the number 10 is represented by an X.

How To Acquire ISBNs

ISBNs in the United States are administered by R.R. Bowker. Bowker charges a fee to process your application. Ten ISBNs cost $225; 100 ISBNs cost $800. Visit www.bowker.com for more information, or to complete an application.

ISBNs in Canada are administered by the National Public Library as a free service. Visit http://www.nlc-bnc.ca/isbn/index-e.html for more information or to apply on-line.

For more information on the ISBN system and how it works, visit www.isbn.org.

About The Author

Juiced Consulting helps business owners package what they know into information products –- such as books, audiotapes and teleclasses –- that they can sell to generate new business revenue. For a free newsletter and other resources, visit http://www.juicedconsulting.com/.

jtribe@juicedconsulting.com

Article Source: Ezine Articles