RFID Adoption Pushes into Food & General Goods Packaging Despite Regulatory Pauses
Radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology is steadily expanding from its traditional realms (like apparel tags and warehouse pallets) into new packaging markets such as food and everyday consumer goods. Even though U.S. regulators paused certain mandates – for example, the FDA’s Food Traceability Rule compliance deadline was extended by 2.5 years to 2028 – companies across the supply chain have not hit pause on RFID adoption. In fact, many industry players view the delay as a temporary setback rather than a stop sign. As one tech CEO noted, the extension “slows down this expected boost to the RFID industry, but I don’t think it shuts it down,” especially since regulators remain committed to future traceability requirements.
Momentum in Food Packaging
In the food sector, RFID is gaining momentum as a cutting-edge tool for traceability and inventory management. The looming (now postponed) FDA traceability regulations had already spurred a resurgence of RFID investments over the past two years. Food brands and retailers began incorporating RFID tags into packaging to meet the original 2026 deadline, and packaging suppliers ramped up efforts to embed smart labels in products. While the compliance timeline shifted, these preparations haven’t gone to waste. Major retailers and restaurants are still accelerating RFID deployments in their food supply chains, driven by goals like improved food safety, reduced spoilage, and operational efficiency. A prime example is Walmart’s recent move to roll out RFID tracking in its fresh grocery departments (meat, dairy, produce) through a partnership with Avery Dennison. This initiative solved longstanding technical hurdles with moisture and refrigeration, and Walmart says it will help cut food waste, ensure freshness, and improve inventory management. Grocery giant Kroger similarly announced it is outfitting its fresh food sections with RFID for inventory automation, and restaurant chain Chipotle completed a nationwide RFID rollout to track ingredients from suppliers – making it the first chain to adopt item-level RFID for food traceability. Such early adopters in the food industry are “providing a leadership space” and could create a flywheel effect that propels RFID into the mainstream.
Extending into General Merchandise
Beyond food, general consumer goods packaging is also seeing an RFID push. Retailers have actually led the charge here for years. Over two decades ago, Walmart began requiring some suppliers to tag products via RFID, and that program has since expanded to nearly every product category the retailer carries. By 2022, Walmart mandated RFID tags on apparel, toys, electronics, home goods and more – establishing a new norm for inventory tracking in general merchandise. This “Walmart effect” drove wider adoption and helped lower RFID costs significantly over time. Now, other brands and retail chains are following suit to gain similar benefits. Companies are even finding niche markets for RFID beyond standard retail: for instance, high-end producers are tagging luxury goods (like fine wines, spirits, and designer handbags) to authenticate products and combat counterfeiting. Packaging converters and label printers have taken note of these trends. A mid-2025 report highlighted how leading label manufacturers (e.g. Avery Dennison) have seen double-digit growth in RFID label sales and are investing in new capacity to meet demand. In one case, a U.S. label converter doubled its production capacity for RFID-enabled packaging, anticipating a surge in orders for hard-to-tag items (including liquids and other challenging products). The message is clear: whether for groceries or general merchandise, RFID is becoming a mainstream feature of modern packaging.
Recent Use Cases in Packaging
To illustrate this surge in adoption, here are a few recent RFID use cases across food and consumer goods packaging:
Walmart (Fresh Food): Long an RFID pioneer in retail, Walmart is now extending RFID tagging to fresh food. By embedding tags on meat, produce, and deli packages, Walmart aims to track each item’s freshness in real time and cut down on unsold waste. This builds on Walmart’s earlier success tagging nearly all non-food merchandise with RFID by 2022.
Kroger (Grocery Retail): The supermarket chain began rolling out RFID smart labels in its produce, dairy, and meat departments. The goal is to automate inventory counts and get instant visibility into stock levels and expiration dates, thereby reducing manual labor and food spoilage.
Chipotle (Food Service): The restaurant chain implemented RFID tags on its ingredient packaging nationwide after a successful pilot. Suppliers now attach RFID labels to shipments (like meat and lettuce), giving Chipotle end-to-end visibility from farm to restaurant. This system improves safety (e.g. quicker recalls) and simplifies quality checks, marking the first such deployment in the fast-casual restaurant space.
Luxury & Specialty Goods: RFID is also making inroads into premium product packaging. For example, wineries and spirit distillers are embedding RFID tags in bottle labels or caps to verify authenticity and track inventory. Likewise, makers of watches and jewelry use RFID seals to deter tampering and theft. These high-value markets are adopting RFID as a counterfeit countermeasure and inventory tool.
Benefits Driving RFID Adoption
Why are so many companies embracing RFID in packaging? The technology offers several tangible benefits that align with business goals of productivity, cost savings, and safety:
Faster Inventory Checks & Less Labor: RFID scanners can read hundreds of tags in seconds without line-of-sight, drastically speeding up stock counts. Instead of scanning items one by one with barcodes, workers can scan an entire pallet or shelf of products instantly. This efficiency frees up labor hours for other tasks and reduces human error in inventory management.
Reduced Waste & Fresher Products: In food applications, RFID tags (combined with digital sensors or use-by date tracking) let retailers monitor product freshness in real time. Stores like Walmart can automatically identify items nearing expiration and pull or discount them proactively. By managing stock more dynamically, grocers expect to minimize unsold goods and food waste.
Improved Traceability & Safety: RFID creates a detailed digital trail for each product as it moves through the supply chain. This is invaluable during recalls or safety incidents – companies can pinpoint affected batches within minutes by querying RFID data, rather than issuing broad recalls. Faster traceability helps protect consumers and limits the scope (and cost) of recalls when contamination or defects occur.
Anti-Counterfeiting & Brand Protection: Unlike standard packaging codes, RFID tags are very hard to clone or alter, making them useful for authenticating products. Luxury brands and pharmaceutical companies use RFID-enabled packaging to ensure only genuine items reach customers. This helps preserve brand trust and can even streamline returns or warranty verification by confirming an item’s identity.
Overcoming Challenges and Looking Ahead
Implementing RFID in packaging hasn’t been without challenges, but the industry is rapidly solving them. For instance, radio-frequency signals historically struggled around metal objects and liquids, which posed problems for tagging beverage bottles, canned goods, or items in cold wet environments. Today, innovators have developed special tag designs and readers to overcome these physics hurdles – even in a refrigerated case or a metal-laden warehouse, RFID can now reliably scan items. Concerns about sustainability are also being addressed. Recent studies show that RFID tags (with their tiny metal antennas and chips) do not impede recyclability of packaging like corrugated boxes; the tags get filtered out like other minor contaminants during paper recycling. Additionally, the cost of RFID hardware and tags continues to drop as adoption scales up, making the technology more affordable than it was in the early 2000s.
Crucially, the drive for better supply chain visibility isn’t going away. Even if some regulatory deadlines are delayed, most experts anticipate significant growth in RFID usage in the next few years. Large packaging and label suppliers report robust demand – for example, Avery Dennison has seen about 15% annual growth in RFID label sales since 2018 and expects that trend to continue, especially in food and healthcare markets. Alternative tracking technologies (like Bluetooth Low Energy and NFC tags) are emerging, but they are also wireless and, in many cases, complementary; so far, they haven’t dethroned RFID’s dominant role. In fact, RFID is more relevant than ever for manufacturers and retailers aiming to optimize their supply chains. “Those that have leaned in on RFID earlier... this is the natural extension to scale this tech and realize additional benefits, as well as compliance,” observes Sandeep Unni, a senior analyst at Gartner. Many in the industry believe that widespread food traceability requirements – whenever they fully arrive – will be the catalyst that finally pushes RFID to mainstream adoption in packaging. As one packaging technology leader put it: “This is going to be the rails that the industry runs on. And we’re just getting started.”