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Industry disruptions, labor shortages, mergers, and acquisitions will all have a significant impact on future growth.

According to studies, manufacturers will focus on embracing automation technologies to boost labeling processes, reduce errors, and improve workflow efficiencies. Global manufacturers anticipate using industry consolidation and labor issues to reevaluate their labeling procedures.

Automation technologies will give manufacturers greater accuracy and control over their labeling procedures, reducing errors from manual processes. With automation, manufacturers can optimize their workflow and save resources while addressing labor shortages and high manufacturing and supply chain costs.

The following factors look at how manufacturers can overcome ongoing challenges.

Supply chain disruptions: Increasing supply chain visibility and traceability, automating processes, and improving quality control are approaches that manufacturing companies are implementing to save resources and more easily adapt to disruptions in supply chains. These approaches enable companies to better plan and respond to changes in their supply chain by having real-time visibility into inventory levels, order status, and shipment information. Automation also helps to reduce errors and improve quality control, leading to improved customer satisfaction and cost savings.

Unified supplier network: Companies create simple, streamlined printing interfaces via a web browser secured by a username and password to simplify the printing process. They can only access labels assigned to suppliers. In a unified supplier labeling system, companies can report on all past label changes and print jobs, resulting in a much lower risk of labeling errors from their suppliers.

Automatic label approval: Manufacturers are streamlining and enforcing the approval process for electronic labels from design to print by configuring automatic workflows. Only approved labels are entered into production to reduce reprints and recall associated with labeling, ensuring only labels with accurate printed information.

Mergers and acquisitions: Recently formed companies accumulate technical debt and different systems due to industry consolidation. Modernization and consolidation of systems lead manufacturers to move away from heavy customization and migrate to the cloud.

Modernizing labeling systems: They are upgrading their labeling environment to leverage only one brand and the latest version available to easily merge systems in the future instead of managing multiple brands and versions of labeling software. To streamline labeling processes and minimize confusion and errors, manufacturers can work with their merged or acquired company to consolidate any labeling software or label data saved between multiple systems.

The cloud: Manufacturers are allowing users to save label files in a central location and print them from anywhere using cloud storage applications such as Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive. They can access data from a cloud-hosted ERP or WMS by printing cloud data on labels with Excel Online or Google Sheets through database connections or OData connections. The cloud-hosted label printing makes it easy for anyone with secure access to log in, scan or key in data, and print labels from anywhere. A cloud-based solution increases agility and scalability.

Labor shortages: The manufacturing industry is hit hard by labor shortages. To combat this, manufacturing companies seek new tools and technologies that will help streamline their data capture and labeling processes. They are also retraining their labeling teams to increase productivity.

Radio-frequency identification (RFID): Many major retail corporations are mandating RFID-labeled products from their suppliers. Manufacturers are implementing more infrastructure around RFID label technology and software, while further recent advancements in RFID in product tracking exist. Bringing RFID into the supply chain will prove beneficial due to its benefits, standards, data collection, and speed.

Automate label printing: Label printing automation is a crucial tool for improving efficiencies and reducing manual labor, which has a higher return on investment. Automating label printing allows employees to focus on more important tasks, such as finding, updating, and printing labels. Automated label printing software watches for updates, parses data from business systems, and prints labels without requiring human interaction.

It is important to establish strong partnerships with technology providers to take advantage of their expertise, resources, and perspectives to overcome manufacturing challenges and take advantage of new opportunities.