Commodity purchasing management system and method

A method of managing commodity purchasing, comprising:

• acquiring customer identifying information identifying a customer;
• storing a number of inventories for each commodity and a number of reserved commodity inventories for the relevant commodity in process of selling;
• identifying a commodity requested by a customer;
• specifying by the customer a method of transferring to the customer the identified commodity requested by the customer;
• judging whether a number of the reserved commodity inventories for the relevant commodity in process of selling in the inventory storage is assignable to the requesting customer according to the specified transfer method for the identified commodity by the requesting customer;
• and
• temporarily reserving a commodity by assigning a number of the reserved commodity inventories for the relevant commodity in the process of selling in the inventory storage to the requesting customer, according to the judging.

An apparatus, comprising:

• a database storage storing a number of inventories and quasi-inventories for each store commodity;
• a customer identifier acquiring customer identification information identifying a customer;
• a commodity identifier that identifies a commodity selected by the identified customer according to commodity identification information;
• and
• a programmed computer processor controlling the apparatus according to a process comprising:
• specifying by the identified customer a method of transferring the selected commodity to the identified customer, according to the identified commodity;
• judging, according to the specified method of transferring the selected commodity to the identified customer, whether a number of inventories of the selected commodity and/or a number of quasi-inventories of the selected commodity in the inventory storage is assignable to the identified customer;
• and
• assigning to the identified customer the number of inventories of the selected commodity and/or the number of quasi-inventories of the selected commodity in the inventory storage, according to the judging.