How a Beach Bum, a Geek and McKinsey Led To A Hilarious Barcode Saga

Ever felt like grocery shopping was a twisted game of hide and seek?

Picture this: Managers once shut down entire stores to count cans of beans. Madness, right? But then, like a hero swooping in to save the day, came the barcode.

Our tale begins in 1948. A frantic president of a Philadelphia food chain begged a Drexel Institute dean to invent a magical way to count groceries automatically. The dean said, “Nah,” but student Bernard Silver eavesdropped and got hooked on the idea. He roped in his buddy, Norman Joseph Woodland, and they set off on an epic quest.

Their first attempt involved ink patterns and ultraviolet light. Spoiler: It flopped. The ink was too expensive and unreliable. Determined, Woodland ditched school and retreated to Florida. There, he had his eureka moment while chilling on the beach, recalling Morse code. Four dots in the sand became lines, and voilà—the barcode was born!

Fast forward to 1966. The National Association of Food Chains (NAFC) convened to discuss automated checkout systems. RCA, holding the original Woodland patent, pitched the bullseye barcode. Kroger, ever the adventurer, volunteered as tribute to test it.

But the real magic happened in the mid-1970s. The NAFC formed the grandly named Ad-Hoc Committee for U.S. Supermarkets on a Uniform Grocery-Product Code. Their mission? Standardize barcodes. They needed a hero, and they found one in McKinsey, the consulting rock stars, who helped design the ultimate 11-digit barcode.

Back in the day, Woodland’s barcode reader was a behemoth—desk-sized, with a 500-watt bulb that doubled as a mini-sun. It captured a sliver of light, wasting the rest. Despite the clunky tech, Woodland and Silver scored a patent for both linear and bullseye barcodes. But the world wasn’t ready yet.

Enter McKinsey, the ultimate problem-solvers. They helped craft a sleek, 11-digit barcode masterpiece, setting the stage for grocery store revolution. Barcodes soon graced everything from soup cans to candy bars, making manual counting a relic of the past.

So, next time you breeze through the checkout line, think of Woodland, Silver, and McKinsey. They turned grocery shopping from a nightmare into a dream. All thanks to a few lines in the sand and a whole lot of genius.