A small e-paper or LCD display mounted at the shelf edge in place of a paper price tag. It connects wirelessly to a cloud platform that pushes the latest price, promotion, and product info in real time. The display holds an image without power, so battery life is typically 7–10 years.

Digital signs are larger LCD/LED displays for marketing content (typically 10"+). ESLs are small e-paper labels for shelf-edge price/product info (typically 1.5"–4.2", with shelf-edge bars going larger). ESLs use far less power and are battery-operated; signs need wired power and are always-on.

Yes. ESLs attach to standard gondola shelves with included clips, to metal racking with magnetic mounts, to glass cases with adhesive, or to high-theft fixtures with screw mounts. See the attachment options guide for which method fits your shelf type.

BWRY is four-color e-paper: black, white, red, and yellow. It's the current mainstream tier as of 2025–2026.

Spectra 6 is six-color e-paper from E Ink (black, white, red, yellow, green, blue) — used in premium ESLs like the ZKong Quantum Series for full marketing creative on the shelf.

See the display glossary for the full breakdown of color tiers.

7–10 years for most BWRY ESLs at one price update per day. Some specialized models claim 15+ years. The honest answer is "depends on update frequency" — labels in stores with hourly promotional cycles run shorter than labels in stores with weekly updates. See our blog post on battery life claims for the full breakdown.

Yes — but you need freezer-rated hardware. Standard ESLs are rated 0–40 °C. The ZKong Shield Series operates down to -25 °C and uses a freezer-rated clip that doesn't snap when stocking.

Most ESLs use a proprietary 2.4 GHz radio link to a gateway (not standard Wi-Fi). The gateway has Ethernet to your network. Bluetooth is used for label configuration via smartphone app, but not for ongoing price updates. See the connectivity glossary for details.

Most modern ESLs include NFC tags. A shopper taps their phone to the label and can be sent to a product page, recipe, review, or video. Available across the Quantum, Arrow, and most other ZKong series. Adoption by shoppers is currently low but growing.

Pricing varies by size, color tier, and quantity. Email us for a quote on your specific spec — we don't list per-unit pricing publicly because real pricing depends on volume and configuration. Pricing is competitive with the major brands; the differentiation is the buying experience (no enterprise contract, no MOQ, US stock).

12–24 months for most US retailers. The savings come from: eliminated paper + printer costs, eliminated labor (price-change rounds), eliminated state pricing-error fines, and reduced shrink (faster markdowns on expiring stock). Use the interactive ROI calculator with your store-specific numbers.

No. Buy 100 labels for one store, or 100,000 for a chain — same purchase process. This is one of the things that distinguishes Retail Digitals from the larger ESL brands, which require enterprise sales engagement and substantial minimums.

Single store, 5,000–30,000 labels: 1–3 weeks from order to live, depending on whether you do labor in-house or with a regional integrator. Multi-store chain: 2–9 months for full rollout, typically deploying 1–4 stores per week after the pilot.

Generally no. ESLs are battery-powered. Gateways need power (typical PoE Ethernet or wall AC) and one Ethernet drop per gateway — most stores already have this in place from the existing IT infrastructure. The exception is wired LCD shelf-edge bars (e.g. Hanshow Lumina Edge), which require power at every shelf — that needs an electrician. Battery-powered alternatives like the Arrow Series avoid this entirely.

Roughly 5,000–20,000 ESLs per gateway, depending on store layout. Big-box stores with high ceilings often run on a single gateway; densely-packed stores or stores with a lot of metal can need two or three. See the gateway placement guide.

Yes — every successful chain deployment we've seen started with a single-store pilot for 4–8 weeks. The pilot validates: gateway coverage, POS sync stability, label attachment fit on your specific shelves, store staff training time, and ROI math. See the pilot guide for the full playbook.

Probably yes. The platform supports REST API webhooks, scheduled SFTP/CSV, and manual web upload — those three methods cover virtually any modern US POS or ERP. See the integrations page for a list of common US systems and our compatibility status with each.

Yes — manual upload is supported and works fine for small pilots, single-store deployments, or stores managing prices manually. Just upload an Excel or CSV file via the platform's web UI.

Indirectly. The ESL pulls from your dispensary POS (Dutchie, Treez, Flowhub, BLAZE, Cova, Greenbits), which reconciles with Metrc on its own schedule. ESLs render the data; compliance lives in your POS. See the integrations page for specifics.

ZKong is the manufacturer of the ESL hardware and cloud platform — based in China, shipping ESLs globally since 2017. Retail Digitals is the US distributor (also operating as ZKong USA) — based in New York, holding US inventory, handling US sales and support directly.

All five make capable hardware with similar core specs. Differences are in: cloud platform features, supported integrations, hardware lifecycle, and (most significantly for US buyers) the buying process. ZKong via Retail Digitals lets you buy direct without enterprise sales engagement; the others typically require enterprise contracts and 4–8 month sales cycles. See the brand comparison page for a 192-product side-by-side, plus dedicated pages for ZKong vs SoluM, ZKong vs Vusion, ZKong vs Hanshow, and ZKong vs Pricer.

Honest answer: at chain scale (500+ stores), the larger brands (Vusion, Hanshow, SoluM, Pricer) have more mature enterprise tooling and dedicated account teams that some chains prefer for procurement reasons. For under 200 stores, the cost + speed advantage of buying direct from RD is usually decisive. Each vs-comparison page calls out specific scenarios where the competitor is the better fit.

New York City, Eastern Time. We don't outsource US support to overseas teams. Phone, email, and screen-share support are standard.

Standard hardware warranty covers manufacturing defects. Replacement units ship from US stock — typical replacement turnaround is under one week. Specifics depend on the SKU; we'll send the warranty doc with your order.

Yes — request a 30–45 minute private walkthrough at the walkthrough request page. We'll show the cloud platform live, customize the ROI math to your store, and answer any specific questions about your stack.