A barcode, written as a web address
Every product you sell already has a GTIN — the number under the barcode (your EAN or UPC is a GTIN). A GS1 Digital Link takes that same number and writes it into a URL:
/01/ says "a GTIN follows"; /10/ adds a batch. Put that URL in a QR code and one printed symbol does two jobs: a retail till reads the GTIN out of it and rings up the sale, and a shopper's phone opens it like any link — landing on a page you control.
What happens on a scan, literally
A phone requests the URL, and the resolver behind the domain answers with a 302 redirect to wherever you've currently pointed that product — a product page, an e-label, a recall notice. On the Resolver tier, machines can ask the same URL for structured data instead and get a linkset. The printed code never changes; the answer does. That's the whole trick, and it's why the resolver — not the QR image — is the part that matters.
Whose domain? Yours. That's the product.
The code on the pack points at a domain. If it's a vendor's domain, every scan of every pack you've ever printed belongs to that vendor's continuity, pricing and goodwill — for the shelf-life of the product. If it's your domain, the code outlives any supplier decision, including a decision to leave us. We think that's the only honest way to sell codes that get printed on physical things, so own-domain is included from the entry tier, not gated behind an enterprise plan.
Static vs dynamic — the difference that's worth paying for
Free generators produce static codes: the destination is baked in at generation time, and once it's printed, it's carved in stone. A dynamic Digital Link points at a resolver, so you can re-point it after printing — which is what makes recalls survivable, seasonal campaigns cheap, and reprints unnecessary. The line we'd have you remember: a Digital Link you can't re-point is a Digital Link you'll have to reprint.