Method and apparatus for creating a bar code
AssigneeTri Ventures Inc.
InventorsDouglas Calaway, Jason Kotte
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A process and article of manufacture for ordering items. Descriptive item information is provided to a consumer on a mass media storage device. The consumer reviews the item information and selects items for purchase. During a check out process a textual order form and bar code, both including order information, are generated. The bar code is applied to the order form and both are transmitted to a vendor via mail, facsimile; upon receipt the vendor reads the bar code to enter the order information. Alternatively, the order information is electronically transmitted to the vendor, in which case it is not necessary to generate the bar code containing the order information.
Claims20
A system for generating an order form for a customer, the system comprising:
- a catalog module including merchandise information;
- a customer information receiving module;
- an encoding module in data communication with the customer information receiving module;
- and
- a printing module in data communication with the encoding module and configured to provide printing instructions sufficient to generate an order form from customer information, the printing module and the encoding module cooperating to at least partially encode the order form, wherein the partially encoded portion of the order form comprises sufficient information to fill an order.
A method of receiving customer specific order information from a customer, comprising:
- supplying the customer with an ordering module that enables the customer to actuate:
- collecting customer specific order information including sufficient information to fill an order;
- encoding the customer specific order information;
- and
- providing instructions sufficient to print the encoded information in a scannable format;
- and
- receiving the customer specific order information from the customer by:
- scanning the customer encoded specific order information;
- decoding the customer specific order information;
- and
- populating a database with the decoded customer specific order information.
An article of manufacture, comprising a program storage medium readable by a processor and embodying one or more instructions executable by the processor to perform a method for generating a partially encoded order form for a customer, the method comprising:
- presenting a catalog of merchandise to the customer;
- collecting customer specific order information related to an order of merchandise from the catalog, the customer specific order information including sufficient information to fill an order;
- encoding the customer specific order information, thereby forming a coded portion;
- and
- printing at least the coded portion, thereby forming a partially encoded order form.
A method of processing an order via computer access to a storage medium and without Internet access, the method comprising:
- providing the storage medium to a customer, the storage medium storing a complete catalog of merchandise without requiring Internet access;
- compiling customer specific order information related to an order of merchandise from the catalog;
- encoding at least a portion of the customer specific order information;
- printing at least the encoded portion of the order form;
- receiving the printed order form;
- and
- decoding the encoded portion of the order form.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.