GS1 Barcodes, Mandatory Or Not?
Hi
im wondering are gs1 barcodes mandatory for amazon as i see other sites selling them for much cheaper without the yearly subscription price. we have our own brand & have many variations of products so use quite a few barcodes. problem is GS1 barcodes are £150 per year for 500/1000 & other sites sell them for £40 one off for 1000 so its a huge huge difference in price. i just don’t want to have issues down the line. anyone have any advice on this?
GS1 Barcodes, Mandatory Or Not?
Hi
im wondering are gs1 barcodes mandatory for amazon as i see other sites selling them for much cheaper without the yearly subscription price. we have our own brand & have many variations of products so use quite a few barcodes. problem is GS1 barcodes are £150 per year for 500/1000 & other sites sell them for £40 one off for 1000 so its a huge huge difference in price. i just don’t want to have issues down the line. anyone have any advice on this?
37 replies
Seller_DROodOAYHftnc
Yes, Amazon will now only accept ones from GS1.
Years ago you could get them from anywhere, but they are more strict now, and I believe some sellers are seeing older listed products with non-GS1 codes being deactivated/suspended as Amazon start to clamp down.
Seller_amUAzjvL5uIzu
Really.4p each as opposed to 11.9p each,not huge when that 11.9p can cover 1000’s of product’.Buy 1000 from ebay & your seller does not renew their GS1 subscription your barcodes are then recycled by GS1 & applied to someone elses product who decides to list on Amazon,boom your account gone!
Seller_zkJj7BZlSrHzG
You can apply for GTIN exemption for items that doesn`t have a UPC/ EAN- GTIN for your own brand /category
It is simple to apply and pretty straight forward
Most products have their own Upc/ Ean numbers however it is useful when you sell bundles of items that will require an identifier.
When listing the products in bulk using excel template you will leave the Ean /UPC section empty and you will see a new column on excel template appearing after approval on that category - - "GTIN exemption reason " there are some options like part of a set , etc…
This is what amazon says ;
“If the product does not have a GTIN
We understand that some products do not have a GTIN. If your product is already listed on Amazon, you can list your offer on the existing product detail page and do not need to provide a GTIN. If your product is not listed on Amazon, request -> GTIN exemption”
if the link doesn`t work you can copy paste below
https://sellercentral.amazon.co.uk/help/hub/reference/200426310
Good Luck 
Seller_yE7wQLht2Ut2g
According to the leadership team on Amazon only GS1 codes are legitimate all other codes are seen as not authentic. currently in the UK there are 5.6 million companies out of which a mere 26 thousands use the GS1 website. this policy is going to wipe out a majority of UK sellers.
In my own catagory you can already see how poor the Amazon catalogue is as the authentic goods are all being removed as the manufacture does not use the GS1 site all you can see are cheaper Ali baba goods. If I or any other seller went on to the GS1 website and bought GS1n codes for these goods we could be taken up for intellectual property theft.
I understand if someone has their own products to bring in this rule but to apply this rule to world famous brands is beyond an act of stupidity.
Seller_Ku3vjk0Ptgvm2
We applied for exemption only takes a second, once accepted it takes about 30 minutes to activate. Once activated add a product and click on the “More details” tab and select exemption reason for the GTIN and then you wont need to add one.
Seller_aNZSbJX3Zn3OU
On a slightly related note, some of our products have been assigned new barcodes by our manufacturer. We have asked Amazon seller support how to change these over and they were of no help at all, is it even possible?
As for GS1, yes get GS1 barcodes, we have used them from the beginning, one of our friends started a small business with barcodes purchased from eBay and after 1 year gradually all of there listings were disabled and ended.
Seller_ftMMn0UeA4IQP
Its considerably cheaper to just jump in and buy 100,000 the first time rather than buy 1000 and then need to buy another 1000 and so on because GS1 wont combine them for you later when you realise you are going to need more and more and will have to keep paying each year for every 1000 that you already have.
(don’t ask me how I know 
)
Seller_ZpRCk4Ny3pa7z
So any products listed way back in the early days with a UPC code from an ebay reseller will not be valid and eventually delisted…correct?
If yes then is it possible to get exemption on currently live listings or will it mean closing the listing and making a new one?
I make everything myself so dont need a barcode but way back you had to list with one and i cant remember exemption being and option.
Seller_fpHJMMwn649ll
Think of it like this:
- £150 to never have any problems with your barcodes
versus - The time and cost it will take you to fix the inevitable issues caused by trying to skimp this part of your business. It seems as each day goes by we get closer to this being a guaranteed outcome rather than just a possibility.
Please don’t ever think of this as ‘just a barcode’, it means a whole lot more than that.
