Patent ID: 8321303

Claim:
A method of detecting out-of-stock conditions for retail products via an RFID data collection system, the method comprising: accessing RFID data associated with a product stocking event, wherein said RFID data includes electronic product codes corresponding to RFID-tagged retail products or product displays, and date and location data for the RFID-tagged retail products or product displays within a retail supply chain, wherein date and location data is obtained by at least one RFID reader to identify whether the RFID-tagged retail products or product displays are located on a retail store sales floor, and to identify whether the RFID-tagged retail products or product displays are located in a retail store backroom; identifying out-of-stock conditions for the product stocking event based on RFID data; and updating a product stocking event plan; wherein the product stocking event is a scheduled product stocking event; wherein the RFID data is current RFID data and further includes information about movements of RFID-tagged retail products or product displays within the retail supply chain and within the retail store; and further comprising: accessing historical RFID data associated with a completed product stocking event, wherein the historical RFID data includes information about movement of RFID tagged retail products within the retail supply chain and within the retail store, including information about movement of RFID-tagged retail products between the retail store backroom and the retail store floor; accessing point-of-sale data associated with the completed product stocking event; analyzing the historical RFID data and point-of-sale data; creating a script for the scheduled product stocking event based on historical RFID data and point-of-sale data; and updating the script based on current RFID movement data and point-of sale data.