A version of the bookstore of the future--where books are identified
and tracked wirelessly by microchips either built in or affixed to
them--has become reality in the Netherlands and made for a striking
presentation by Ronald Janssen, senior manager of ICT at Centraal
Boekhuis, at the annual meeting of the International Supply Chain
Specialists yesterday in Frankfurt.
The 11,840-sq.-ft. store, called Selexyz Almere and owned by BGN, the
largest bookseller in the Netherlands, opened in Almere on April 22.
Because it is BGN's first new store--its other 40-plus stores were
acquisitions--and allowed for adopting the technology from the ground
up, it became a pilot project for the company and Centraal Boekhuis
(Central Bookhouse or CB), the largest book wholesaler in the country.
The new technology is radio frequency identification (RFID), which is
being used already by a handful of libraries in the U.S. As applied to
the Almere project, CB puts RDIF tags on each book it supplies to
Selexyz Almere; every tag has a unique number that identifies and
applies only to that copy of the book. On leaving the warehouse, books
for the store are packed in boxes that go through an RFID "tunnel." The
complete contents are identified in seconds regardless of the placement
of the books in the boxes; CB then generates an electronic advance
shipping notice to Selexyz Almere. On arrival at the store, the boxes
are read in a similarly quick and accurate way. By contrast, at other
BGN stores and like most traditional stores, the process of checking
shipments against packing slips and ASNs takes a minimum of five to six
minutes.
The RFID tagging allowed Selexyz Almere to receive and process its
opening stock of 35,000 books in three days compared to the usual two
weeks. The system also allows two staff members at Selexyz Almere to do
a full store inventory in two days, with each person using a wand that
reads the tags. By contrast, in other BGN stores, a staff of 20-25 does
the inventory in a day, scanning bar codes and requiring the store to
be closed.
RFID lets the bookseller keep track of books much more accurately,
particularly in the cases of those that "walk" from their original
places on shelves or are stolen. The store inventory is available to
customers on four kiosks, which can tell them exactly where the books
are. (The tags are deactivated when the book is sold.)
The bookseller says that RFID has made its inventory database more
accurate, freed up time for booksellers to work with customers and let
it increase its stock of books while decreasing the number of copies of
each title. BGN estimates that sales are 6%-8% higher than they would
be without RFID.
RFID has also saved lots of money, BGN says. In the case of taking
inventory, the company saves annually about 200,000 euros (about
$255,000), mostly in staff salary. Moreover, by not having to close to
take stock, the store does not lose estimated sales of 260,000 euros
(about $331,000).
BGN likes the system so much that it aims to amplify RFID and use it in
a store that will open November 8 in Maastricht. The store will use
RFID in a similar way to Selexyz Almere but with one enhancement: it
will also be used for theft prevention, too.
BGN and CB are working on an eventual enhancement that's even more
futuristic than what's been implemented so far: "smart" shelves that
have RFID antennae in them that can scan the books on them and provide
"near real time inventory."
BGN wants to expand RDIF technology into its existing stores, which is
prompting CB to plan some changes: by the second quarter next year, the
wholesaler aims to automate the tagging process at its warehouse. It is
also encouraging publishers, who so far see little immediate economic
advantage to themselves, to add tags during the printing process.
While planning the pilot project, research by CB, BGN and others found
that a cost of 17 cents per tag (nearly 22 U.S. cents) was a breakeven
point. Competition among tag suppliers helped push costs to about 10
cents (13 cents) a tag. The research also suggested that large
retailers would be the major proponents of the use of RFID in the book
industry, as has been the case in the Netherlands so far.--John Mutter