RFID in point-of-purchase promotional management and item level packaging; creating the business case for Colgate-Palmolive

Radio Frequency Identification technology (RFID) enables the collection of data and electronic sending of asset information without a person needing direct physical contact with that asset. RFID gives one access to remote real-time tracking of the event occurrences (or movement) for each item or asset as it goes though the entire supply chain network.;These collective attributes make RFID unique compared to other inventory management systems.;To justify a return on investment (ROI) from this technology, one must look at more than just its ability to increase affiances within the transit system or warehouse, as are the current executions that comply with retailer mandates. Incorporating RFID in a package engineering strategy for a new product campaign will allow the development of new business cases, bringing new affiances to Colgate-Palmolive and rationalization for the financial investment into the technology.;RFID will increase product sales for Colgate-Palmolive by facilitating the proactive management of Point-of-Purchase (P-O-P) display execution compliance of new product launch campaigns at retail level. Through the benefit of real-time visibility into the P-O-P display event occurrences available from an RFID tracking program, the active management of a P-O-P Promotion and improvement in display placement compliance during the promotional campaign, Colgate-Palmolive will attain sales lift. Further affiances resulting from Item Level RFID applications are managing out of stocks, proper product placement within assigned Plano-grams, and by real-time sales activity data that is accessible through a secure Internet Local Area Network (LAN) channel or the EPCglobal Wide Area Network (WAN).;The purpose of this thesis project is to make recommendations for a Colgate-Palmolive global RFID implementation strategy that will utilize this technology to increase product sales. The strategy is directed at proactively managing the in-store execution compliance of P-O-P displays. Recommendations will also include the usage of RFID passive tags on individual items. The recommendations are based upon case study research of a successful Procter & Gamble (P&G) new product launch, analysis of key findings from current RFID promotional campaigns being managed by Goliath Solutions LLC with their retail customer Walgreens, and research analysis of a Colgate-Palmolive experiment using Item Level RFID within an interactive RFID-enabled P-O-P display.;Conclusions are made by the analysis and summary of key documented sources from the 2006 successful new product launch of Gillette's Fusion that credits the use of RFID for creating a profitable business case for the future use of RFID in a new product promotional launch campaign. The key findings of a current business model developed by Goliath Solutions, utilizing active RFID tags in promotional management campaigns to track key performance indicators within a campaign execution, are summarized to highlight the financial benefit of RFID. These campaigns are analyzed for the increase in product sales improvement from the resulting retail compliance to in-store promotional programs. Additionally, this thesis project will analyze the supply chain productivity benefit attained through real-time data capturing at Item Level that RFID provides. Analyzing how real-time Item Level data provides Colgate-Palmolive with product "location awareness," will allow the management of out of stock items and plano-gram compliance.;This thesis project will also further the study of RFID applications within the proactive management of a promotional campaign and item level packaging by making subject recommendations for future research.