December 07, 2017 Industry news
GS1 UK is pleased to announce details of productDNA:Hub – a brand new industry-governed service that delivers accurate and consistent data and images for the UK retail industry and shoppers
productDNA:Hub is a transformative service – developed in close co-operation between GS1 UK and the retail industry – that will offer a universal format for retailers and suppliers to share and manage product data and images.
The new industry-owned and governed service has been established to address the common need across the retail industry to improve product data quality and efficient sharing of product between retailers and suppliers.
Key benefits for the retail industry include:
- Establish a universal format for suppliers to share product data and images
- Increase confidence among retailers in the product data they receive
- Reduce the amount of inaccurate data
- Easier for the industry to provide customers with accurate and consistent information about the products they are buying
All of this will help the retail industry to get back to their primary purpose – increasing efficiencies and delivering excellent services and value to their customers.
Earlier this year, 12 leading retail businesses, including L’Oréal, Mondelēz International and Waitrose, signed an industry charter committing themselves to adopting a single product data and image service.
Since then, GS1 UK and the industry have together established productDNA:Hub, which sets out agreed processes and rules around sharing product data and images.
productDNA:Hub is based around three components. It enables suppliers to share product data and images with retailers in a consistent format with standardised attributes and data fields; it catalogues product data and images collateral; and product data is independently audited and verified to ensure accuracy and quality.
The unique service defines and manages more than 150 industry-agreed data attributes for products across the grocery sector, including physical product data such as dimensions, weight and volume, as well as ingredients, nutritional values and allergen information.
GS1 UK is managing productDNA:hub on behalf of the industry, through the Retail Grocery Advisory Board, whose members represent almost 80% of the UK retail grocery market.
The product data and images are owned by suppliers, without any third-party commercial constraints, and all the data attributes follow rules established by GS1 global standards, with further attributes to cover additional retail sectors planned for later in 2018.
Gary Lynch, Chief Executive of GS1 UK, said: “Retailers and suppliers have spent years wrestling with the challenges of managing and sharing product data and images. Historically, there has been a huge problem with incompatible systems and multiple processes. This has led to inaccurate and unreliable data across the retail sector, which has affected the shopper experience.
“Only by working together has the industry finally been able to solve the problem with productDNA:hub, a single source of trusted product data and images for every retailer and supplier, including the smallest suppliers and start-ups.”
productDNA:Hub will be implemented by early adopters in the grocery sector from the New Year ahead of a full industry launch planned for summer 2018.