Decathlon is one of the biggest sporting goods designers and retailers in the world. Founded in 1976, the France-based family company has grown to a network of 1,817 stores across 79 countries in addition to its online shop.
Keeping each of these channels of commerce fully stocked presents a significant logistical challenge. That’s why Decathlon turned to RAIN RFID to transform its inventory management. Today, Decathlon provides an example of how wireless technologies, like RAIN RFID, can be used to digitise its global operations and in turn create a more efficient, transparent supply chain.
Decathlon is also a Board Member of the RAIN Alliance, an organisation which is simplifying, standardising and accelerating the adoption of RAIN technology to enable businesses to improve traceability, effectiveness, and sustainability.
To learn more about both RAIN technology and how Decathlon is using it, IoT Insider sat down with Aileen Ryan, President and CEO of the RAIN Alliance, and Hervé d’Halluin, Leader of RFID and Traceability at Decathlon.
The challenge
According to d’Halluin, Decathlon’s primary challenge was scale. As well as its global reach as a retailer, it also operates a number of subsidiary brands which manufacture products including Quechua hiking gear and Simond climbing shoes. For Decathlon’s business model to function as intended, it is imperative that these twin functions can work harmoniously.
“Decathlon needed a solution that could juggle logistics, inventory management, tracking products, customer engagement and ensure sustainability throughout the entire supply chain and across millions of products,” says d’Halluin.
That solution was RAIN RFID, a passive UHF RFID wireless technology that uses tags and readers to identify, locate, authenticate and engage with trillions of items. d’Halluin says, “We turned to RAIN technology almost 20 years ago as we recognised the need for transparency at the lowest granularity, all along the value chain and knew it could offer the solutions we needed.”
For Ryan, its advantages are clear: “RAIN-based data can be stored, managed and analysed in the cloud, delivering real-time, actionable insights. For a retailer the size of Decathlon, it’s the perfect fit.”
Today, every single Decathlon product carries a RAIN RFID tag that holds its unique ID based on GS1 Standards. Meanwhile, all affiliated factories, trucks, warehouses, and stores are equipped with RAIN readers to allow each product to be tracked throughout the entire supply chain from manufacturing to store checkout.
“This enhances traceability and enables partners to better manage production time, waste materials, and shipping,” says d’Halluin.
As products move through logistics warehouses, RAIN technology continues to capture and update data, making inventory checks effortless and routine. This ensures the availability of each product at the right place, with the right quantity at the right time, helping improve turnover and avoid overstocking.
The benefits of the technology don’t end once it reaches the shop floor. The same tags used for inventory management can also be used as its electronic article surveillance (EAS) security tag, providing the same theft deterrent and security as a traditional HardTag but without the need to clip anything onto the product.
The tags have also helped to revolutionise the checkout experience. “With RAIN-enabled checkouts, customers simply place items in the basket, and everything is scanned automatically,” says d’Halluin. “This not only ensures a frictionless checkout experience that elevates sales conversion rates, but it also allows staff to spend more time supporting and engaging with customers on the shop floor, ultimately creating a better shopping experience for everyone. And should the customer wish to return the product within our standard one-year warranty period, the tag allows us to easily verify legitimate products without the customer needing a receipt or any other proof of purchase.”
Scalability and security through standards
Ryan notes that Decathlon’s success with scalable deployment demonstrates the value of trusted international standards.
“Clearly defined standards such as those endorsed by the RAIN Alliance are a key tool for those looking to deploy any solution at scale.” she says. “An international retailer such as Decathlon works with countless partners to stock their stores, to equip their warehouses with the necessary equipment, and transport their goods.
Standards ensure that RAIN RFID tags and readers can work as they should, regardless of whether it’s in a warehouse in France or a store in Brazil. That consistency removes one of the biggest barriers to global deployment.”
However, like any connected system that operates at such scale, ensuring that interoperability and scalability do not come at the expense of security is paramount. The sporting goods market is rife with counterfeit goods, and so it is vital that the supply chain is primed to identify illegitimate or cloned tags.
“Each RAIN-backed Unique Item Identifier is, as the name would suggest, unique,” says Ryan. “This means that it unequivocally identifies a specific item it is associated with, and cannot be changed or rewritten. For product or item authenticity applications like luxury items or vehicle license plates, RAIN also offers cryptographically secure tags that resist tampering and cloning.”
Looking to the future
Since the RAIN Alliance’s formation in 2015, the ecosystem has continued to evolve, advancing education, standards, policies and new capabilities. One of the most exciting developments, Ryan says, is the integration of RAIN technology into smartphones.
“Integrating RAIN readers into everyday smartphones will make it possible for consumers and enterprises to interact with RAIN-tagged products without needing specialized equipment. This will allow any authorised user to securely interact with connected items, unlocking enhanced in-store customer experiences, enabling up-selling, cross-selling and product authentication like never before,” said Ryan.
For Decathlon, the next focus is sustainability, as d’Halluin says, “We continue to prepare for Digital Product Passport (DPP) legislation, which will be mandatory by 2027, first for batteries, followed by textiles. The same RAIN RFID tags that help track stock today will soon help enable tomorrow’s circular business models, supporting transparency and enhancing traceability to facilitate second-life products, in turn making the clothing and apparel industries more sustainable.”
What began as a logistical challenge has become a platform for innovation, he says. By using a single, interoperable standard from GS1, Decathlon has turned its supply chain into a living, data-rich ecosystem that benefits customers, employees, and the planet.
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