Buying EAN codes

soolin

Apologies as I think this has been asked already, but I can't find the thread. Has anyone bought EAN codes specifically for use on eBay, and if so did it have any impact on sales?

I understand that to buy official codes you need to register officially and pay an annual fee (apologies all the pertinent research is on my PC and I can't remember the name of the organisation), is that the only way to aquire codes?

There is quite a lot of stuff online from Amazon sellers who have had their accounts suspended for using codes bought on eBay, nothing from ebay sellers yet but it is early days, but I don't want to run into problems.

Any advice would be useful.

RFW

I've bought for use on Amazon but not from Ebay.

I don't understand how someone can get suspended for using Ebay bought ones. The only problem I could see is if they were incorrect or already in use on another product. Neither of those are offences that would get you suspended, they just wouldn't get the items listed. I've previously put an incorrect product code for a new product on Amazon and it just disappears.

soolin

Thank you RFW.

I will look into it a bit more, but was worried about the cases , some quite recent where Amazon sellers have had issues as the codes were unregistered (or something). I imagine that once these codes become mainstream on eBay, as they are on Amazon, then people might have the same problems.

My sales are OK ish at the moment but I was thinking about the future if ebay start to enforce the requirement. None of my items, even my bread and butter ones currently have codes.

ballisticbrian

Buying them on eBay is no different to people needing bar codes and going through Asda writing down the codes off the tins of beans and soups and using them. They aren't registered to you and never will be.

RFW

ballisticbrian wrote: »

Buying them on eBay is no different to people needing bar codes and going through Asda writing down the codes off the tins of beans and soups and using them. They aren't registered to you and never will be.

I still can't see how that would get an account suspended. There's no way of knowing if a product that you haven't 'manufactured' yourself has the correct barcode on.

I used to know someone in the bedding trade who used made up barcodes for their products. How would a buyer of those know unless there was another product on Amazon/Ebay with the same code?

As far as I know there's nothing illegal in using a random barcode, I don't think they're copyrightable.

I do know a lawyer who works in trademarks and such so I'll ask when I get a chance.

Gleeful

I bought mine from Barcodelove.eu

soolin

I've taken a gamble and bought myself 1000 and ebay accept the numbers on the few I've tried so far- so I'll see if that makes a difference to sales.

justjohn

We bought from ebay. There are only 3 ways as far as I know to get legit codes. From a reseller regd with GS1 or GS1 themselves.


However GS1 is subscription based.


In the early days blocks off EAN's were sold to companies with no subscription. These are the codes you want to purchase if you can.


So you want to find an owner rather than a re-seller / GS1
that's my understanding of it someone can correct me if I am wrong.

justjohn

RFW wrote: »

I still can't see how that would get an account suspended. There's no way of knowing if a product that you haven't 'manufactured' yourself has the correct barcode on.

I used to know someone in the bedding trade who used made up barcodes for their products. How would a buyer of those know unless there was another product on Amazon/Ebay with the same code?

As far as I know there's nothing illegal in using a random barcode, I don't think they're copyrightable.

I do know a lawyer who works in trademarks and such so I'll ask when I get a chance.

If the owner of a barcode is a member of GS1 you can pull basic contact details.

RFW

The more you look into it the more of a racket it seems. Essentially someone is selling random numbers with a strange sequencing. There's nothing proprietorial about it as far as I can tell.

If I buy a piece of cheese from the deli counter in a supermarket it has a unique barcode that is randomly generated, I doubt Tesco aren't getting a new barcode every time or paying anyone for the privilege.

As for the suspended Amazon sellers they appear to have put a new barcode on an existing item. So instead of listing Levi 501s under the actual Levi 501 listing they were listing their own and using a different barcode. Amazon and the rights owner don't like that kind of thing.

soolin

I've added EAN numbers to around 20 of my items so far (it is very boring ) and by a strange co incidence one of my listings that had died a year or so ago suddenly had a sale within 6 hours of adding the EAN.

This particular listing had been popular about a year or so ago but as soon as I restocked it just stopped selling and I've sold perhaps 2 in the last year.

it's probably just a statistically anomaly, but to add an EAN and then see a sale almost immediately was odd- EAN numbers can't make that difference surely?