Systems and methods for managing inventory of aggregated post-consumer goods

• US 20070185612A1
• Filed: 02/08/2006
• Published: 08/09/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 02/08/2006
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Re Community Holdings II, Inc. (Republic Services Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Casella Waste Systems Incorporated
• Inventors: Stevens, S., Gray, Steven, Wilborne, James, Langlois, Timothy, Scherer, Christopher, Potter, Matthew, Charter, Scott
• Application Number:
  US11/349,120
• Publication Number:
  US 20070185612A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 700/215
• CPC Class Codes: B30B 9/3007 Control arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: G07G 1/0036 Checkout procedures
• CPC Class Codes: G07G 1/009 the reader being an RFID reader

Abstract

Systems and methods for placing a radio frequency identifier (RFID) tag on a bale, reading the RFID tag on the bale, and updating a storage repository that includes information pertaining to the bale. The systems and methods can be used to allow inventory management of bales for quality control.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

a) placing at least one radio frequency identifier (RFID) tags on a group of products;

b) reading the at least one RFID tags on the group of products; and

c) updating a storage repository comprising information pertaining to the groups of products.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the group of products is a bale.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

d) repeating step b); and

e) repeating step c).

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

f) comparing information collected in step c) with information collected in step e).

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

g) performing one or more quality control routines if the information collected in step c) is different from the information collected in step e).

6. The method of claim 4, wherein said comparing comprises at least one of:

i) determining a change in a total number of bales;

ii) determining a change in a location of one or more bales; and

iii) determining a change in a number of bales in a classification.

7. The method of claim 2, wherein said storage repository comprises at least one classification for the bale.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein said classification comprises at least one of a quality of bale, a baler operator, a pressure applied by a baler during a baling operation, a location of a bale during a baling operation, a date of a baling operation, a time of a baling operation, and a weather condition during a baling operation.

9. The method of claim 2, wherein said at least one RFID tag comprises information pertaining to at least one of a quality of bale, a baler operator, a pressure applied by a baler during a baling operation, a location of the bale, a date of a baling operation, a time of a baling operation, and a weather condition during a baling operation.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising writing at least one information pertaining to the groups of products to the at least one RFID tags.

11. A computer program product residing on a computer readable medium, the computer program product comprising instructions for causing a computer to:

a) read at least one radio frequency identifier (RFID) tag on a group of products;

b) update a storage repository comprising information pertaining to the group of products.

12. The computer program product of claim 11, wherein the group of products is a bale.

13. The computer program product of claim 12, further comprising instructions for causing a computer to:

c) repeat instruction a); and

d) repeat instruction b).

14. The computer program product of claim 13, further comprising instructions for causing a computer to:

e) compare information collected in step b) with information collected in instruction d).

15. The computer program product of claim 14, further comprising instructions for causing a computer to:

f) perform one or more quality control routines if the information collected in instruction b) is different from the information collected in instruction d).

16. The computer program product of claim 12, wherein said comparing instructions comprise instructions for causing a computer to:

i) determine a change in total number of bales;

ii) determine a change in location of one or more bales; and

iii) determine a change in number of bales in a classification.

17. The computer program product of claim 12, wherein said storage repository instructions comprise instructions to assign at least one classification for the bale.

18. The computer program product of claim 17, wherein said classification instructions comprise at least one of a quality of bale, a baler operator, a pressure of baler, a location of the bale, a date, a time, and a weather condition.

19. The computer program product of claim 12, wherein said reading instructions comprise instructions to read from an RFID tag at least one of a quality of bale, a baler operator, a pressure of baler, a location of the bale, a date, a time, and a weather condition.

20. The computer program product of claim 11, further comprising instructions for causing a computer to write at least one information pertaining to the group of products to the at least one RFID tags.