Textual/Printed/Reference Materials

About

Textual/Printed/Reference Materials is the GS1 Global Product Classification segment that books, magazines and maps sit under. A segment is the highest level of the classification and is defined as a particular industry.^[1] Publication 286 gives this segment no definition text of its own, and none for the family or the four classes beneath it, so none is reproduced here.^[2] Its single family repeats the segment's own name, Textual/Printed/Reference Materials (60010000), and holds four classes: Books (60010200), Periodicals (60010300), Maps (60010400) and a variety-packs class (60010100).^[2]

Below the segment the hierarchy runs through family and class to the brick, which is the level products are actually classified against. The three upper layers exist only to reach the right brick and are not communicated through the GS1 data pool, which is why a product page carries a brick code and never this one.^[3] Worked through, the chain reads: the brick Printed Books/Compositions (10000926) sits in the class Books (60010200), in the family Textual/Printed/Reference Materials (60010000), in this segment.^[2] The bricks divide each class by medium rather than by subject, so Books separates printed, digital and audio editions, and Periodicals does the same.^[2]

Products in this segment carry a barcode built unlike any other on this site. GS1 does not issue the prefixes 978 and 979 to a company: it reserves them for Bookland (ISBN), and 977 for serial publications (ISSN).^[4] A book's EAN-13 is its own thirteen-digit ISBN, which needs no separate number to be bar coded,^[5] while a magazine's is built from the eight-digit ISSN that identifies the title across all its issues and media.^[6] Inside 979 the sub-range 979-0 is reserved for the ISMN, the ISO 10957 identifier for printed music, which GPC gives no brick of its own.^[7] For these barcodes the prefix therefore names the numbering scheme rather than a GS1 member organisation, and no company owns it. GPC is republished twice a year, in May and November, and users are given six months to move their systems to a new version.^[3]

Subcategories

• Textual/Printed/Reference Materials

References

1. ↑ GS1: How Global Product Classification (GPC) works GS1. publication. Accessed 2026-09-12.
2. ↑ GS1 GPC Browser, publication 286 (May 2026) GS1. registry. Accessed 2026-09-12.
3. ↑ GS1 Netherlands and GS1 Belgium & Luxembourg: GPC in a nutshell, version 2.0, June 2024 GS1 Netherlands. publication. Accessed 2026-09-12.
4. ↑ GS1: GS1 Company Prefix, with the prefix allocation table GS1. registry. Accessed 2026-09-12.
5. ↑ International ISBN Agency: ISBN Bar coding International ISBN Agency. publication. Accessed 2026-09-12.
6. ↑ ISSN International Centre: What is an ISSN? ISSN International Centre. publication. Accessed 2026-09-12.
7. ↑ Wikipedia: International Standard Music Number Wikipedia. other. Accessed 2026-09-12.