Call it the Wal-Mart effect: The megaretailer has been a major proponent of radio-frequency identification technology for almost as long as people have talked about it. As a result, RFID has been considered a retail industry technology. But when it comes to the next phase of deployments--item-level tagging--retailers aren't leading the way.
Most retailers can't find a business case for item-level tagging. Only 9% of them have a time line for implementing RFID, compared with 44% of manufacturers, according to a May survey from RFID vendor NCR(NCR). Several prominent U.S. retailers, including Home Depot, OfficeMax(OMX), and Sears, have no immediate plans to deploy RFID at even the case or pallet level. U.K. retailer Tesco conducted a trial involving RFID tags attached to individual DVDs and CDs but says it's evaluating the future of item-level tagging in its business.
