by Apogeonline
November 7, 2005 - UnusualBiz
The tattoo on terrorism comes zucchini
Roberto Venturini
Do not be surprised if one day you will find at the supermarket vegetables tattooed, it's for our safety (and for the sake of marketing)
It will not probably many years before they even appear on our tables vegetables and vegetables subjected to a process of tattooing. But, at least for the moment, do not expect cucumbers with tribal motifs and grapefruit with the Harley logo. Unfortunately or fortunately, the initiative has more serious reasons.
A question of money and marketing. And damn labels
years you are looking for, da parte dei produttori, di trasformare un prodotto tipicamente commodity (come un cetriolo) in un prodotto branded, assegnando una marca che nobiliti e differenzi il prodotto. Caso assolutamente tipico, tanto per citarne uno, le mele Melinda. Che se gli togli il bollino, difficile riconoscerle e soprattutto difficile venderle allo stesso prezzo.
Dato che la natura, pur avendo concepito dei packaging perfetti per i suoi prodotti, non ha però previsto l'invenzione della pubblicità, è risultato finora piuttosto difficile migliorare la confezione naturale. Tutto ciò che si era riusciti a fare era appiccicare uno di quei maledetti bollini autoadesivi, che su certe verdure si rivelano fastidiosissimi da togliere.
Quel it worse is that the food industry in recent years has produced thousands of new products, species and varieties, each with a different charge. And to the supermarket becomes the complex issue of pricing of products and establish the cost of four apples that we bought, we can not expect the cashier to temporary work Esopus Spitzenberg how to identify an apple from a variety of Haralson.
Hence the interest in a labeling solution that makes less gummy labels (that cost), which identifies (eg. With a nice bar code) the nature and variety of its product and that would allow easy reading at the cash (and any other step in the supply chain) the characteristics technical product.
national security comes into play
In these times of paranoia, then there are those who long ago started to sleep because of restless peppers and eggplants. Commodity products, are citizens without identity, without fingerprints.
From the standpoint of food safety concern is to have these anonymous in circulation and the issue of traceability of the supply chain is hot, especially in countries where it is feared that the vegetables and the fruits of the fields can be used to commit terrorist acts, criminal or fraudulent. So much so, in a 2002 law, the U.S. provides for a series of mandatory labeling of products, indicating the country of origin and so on, the law remained a dead letter in many areas so far due to technical problems such as difficulty to insert a RFID chip beans sold in any hypermarket.
The appearance of the integrated food security with national defense is one more reason then that is already leading in the U.S. adoption of laser tattoo, finally allowing to uniquely identify the nature, type and plot of origin of the product, so difficult to forge.
The tattoo process is relatively simple: a laser beam strikes the top of the skin, leaving a Code (numeric or bar) just readable but very strong. And because the process (with some exceptions) does not use ink or other consumables, it is ecologically and economically. Moreover, due to the negligible depth of the incision, the characteristics of the product and its conservation are not compromised.
We talk about the apple, check the snake
technology, however, lends itself to a series of further developments and applications, less serious and more marketing oriented.
As mentioned before, can be a good solution to build a brand even on those products that have not had such tattooed logo, slogan or testimonial communication so far on our monotonous fruits and vegetables.
But with a little step further, check here that the catchphrase of the modern world, where anything can be turned into a media (or at least you can try).
Fruits and vegetables may therefore become the media to contain advertisements, engraved monochrome laser, which will do much to see in the showcases of supermarkets and fruit of our homes.
melons and watermelons are very popular, because of their size that make them suitable for large community and strong impact. Provided that the official color of the sponsor's corporate image is the yellow or green.
Mangoes and papayas will become the medium of choice for company travel and tourism in exotic locales.
And there could be a more appropriate medium for a telephone line from the top of a beautiful erotic Delicious apple, the color red.
