How to print labels in Word

Whether you are distributing groceries from a retail store, selling homemade goods, or selling package food from your personal quaint business, the product should be properly labeled with accurate information including the name, price and barcode. Attaching a barcode to each product will help avoid any human error as well as improving the efficiency of product transactions, especially with a point-of-sale system such as Alnicosoft. For a detailed understanding about “Barcode” please refer to the blog “Barcode”.

Generate Barcode in Word

There are multiple ways to generate barcodes labels for the products. Microsoft word can be utilized to generate labels for the product. The steps below demonstrate how you can generate a document containing appropriate labels for your products. Example image –

Microsoft Word field codes support 10 types of barcodes, including UPC, Code 39, and Code 128. We will be using “Code 128” to demonstrate the steps to create labels. You will need to have a printer and compatible paper to print the labels.

Product list in Excel sheet

You may have an excel file containing all product details. If not, then the first step is to create an excel file. The format of the file needs to be as follows :

Please note –

The first row is used to define the column name. The word is going to use the data of the “Barcode” column to generate a corresponding barcode image.
Price column must be text and it needs to be started with a ‘$’ symbol. Word is going to print the exact price including ‘$’ on the label.

Save the file in the local drive.

The next step is to import the product excel file in a new word document and print labels for each individual product by utilizing word field codes.

Word Field Codes

Field codes are placeholders of data defined in word documents in a particular manner so that actual value can be placed dynamically by the Word processor. The “DisplayBarcode” and “MergeField” field codes are being used to generate labels.

DisplayBarcode

This field code is used to generate the barcode. This accepts mainly two parameters – actual barcode value and type of the barcode. For more detail please refer – DisplayBarcode

MergeField

This field code is used to collect data from the data source (like an excel file) and print in a word document dynamically.

Create Product Labels

Following steps will import the product list from the spreadsheet to a word document and generate the labels.

Start the Mail Merge Wizard

Open a new word document and click on the “Mailing” menu.
Click on the “Start Mail Merge” button and then click on the “Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard” sub-menu. This should open the “Mail Merge” wizard near the right bar.

Word Label Setting

Select document type “Labels” option and click on “Next: Starting document”.

Click on the option “Labels” to select different label types. A “Label Option” popup will be displayed.
Select the appropriate label vendor and product number. This product number should be printed on the labels paper package purchased from the vendor otherwise, select the appropriate product for the product list. Please make sure the correct label information is displayed in the “Label Information” section.

After selecting the correct label options, click on “Next: Select recipient” to read the product data from the excel file containing product information.

Import Excel in Word

In this step, you need to select and import the data from the product excel file list. Click on the “Browse” menu available in “Use an existing list” block.

Word will open a popup with all product information. You will be able to import the data from a single sheet. Uncheck the row in case you don’t want to print the label for that product. Otherwise, click ok.

Creating Label Template in Word

This will display the page something like below. Where “<<next Record>>” depicts the position of each label. Now, generate the template using field codes.

Click “Next: Arrange your labels”.

Click “More Items” to display the popup with all column names of the excels file. The system will allow you to choose the columns which you would like to display on the product label.

Double click fields in sequence 1) Description 2) Name 3) Barcode.

This will insert a DB field name as «Description»«Name»«Price» in the word document.

Place a cursor in between «Description» and «Name» and press enter two times. The word document will look like –

Now, we need to follow a few more steps to print the barcode between the description and the name.

Place the cursor in between «Description» and «Name». Then press Control+F9, this will enable us to enter Field Code in the word document.

Enter DisplayBarcode” including the quotations.
Place the cursor beside the quote.

Then, press Control+F9 and type “MergeField Barcode”. Place the cursor at the position marked with orange color.

Enter ” Code128 \t \h 1440 | in between last two brackets.

Click on “Update all labels” to copy the layout from the first label to all the rest.

Preview and Update Label

Click on the “Next: Preview your labels” link. This will give you an opportunity to modify the template.

Please note a space has been added in between “<<Name>> and “<<Price>>. The space has been added in the first label and then, clicked on “Update all labels” to replicate the changes to the rest of the labels.

Print Product Labels

Click the “Next: Complete the merge” and save for future reference or print the document.

Conclusion

The process to generate the barcode using MS-Word is relatively simple. This may be the fastest and cheapest process if you already maintain your product list in excel file and have a licensed version of Microsoft Word, especially if you rather print the label through a normal printer rather than buying a specific label printer. The barcode generated using this process is fully compatible with the AlnicoSoft System.

References

Add barcodes to labels microsoft https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/add-barcodes-to-labels-495cf789-c9d9-4ea5-8eb9-7299170d4831. Retrieved 05 December 2023.
Field codes: DisplayBarcode microsoft https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/field-codes-displaybarcode-6d81eade-762d-4b44-ae81-f9d3d9e07be3 Retrieved 05 December 2023.

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