JPH0744617A - Device and method for controlling image storage - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To control information on each article including images and information on a customer by relating the information with each other. CONSTITUTION:An image pickup is performed for a customer and an article in an image generation part 10 and the image is stored together with the link and key information for each customer and each article in the customer information storage part 24 and article information storage part 26 of a data storage part 22. The sales information on articles for every customer is stored in a sales information storage part 28. A processing part 20 retrieves the customer and article information storage parts 24 and 26 according to the instruction of a designation input part 40, retrieves one of the information on a specified customer and the information on a specified article with images or retrieves the information on the specified customer from the customer and article information storage parts 24 and 26 based on the sales information stored in the sales information storage part 28 and the information on each article that the customer purchased corresponds each of the information with images and displays the information on a display part 42.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image storage management device and an image storage management method for appropriately searching and displaying stored image data.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In stores and sales companies that sell products, product sales management and customer management are important management tasks. Recently, with regard to sales management, POS (Point of Sales) management has been introduced, and the bar code etc. attached to the tags of products is read to determine the sales condition of the products and serve as a guideline for ordering and returning products. By doing so and by accumulating information, it has become possible to easily determine what kind of product is sold in what season, day of the week, and time zone. That is, the computerization of sales management is very advanced.

On the other hand, in many cases, customer management is carried out on a paper basis such as a customer card, and the content thereof is only character information without an image. Alternatively, the customer's card was simply pasted with a silver halide photograph or polaroid photograph of the customer.

In recent years, computerization has also advanced in this customer management, and I such as a credit card-sized service card with a bar code or a magnetic tape or a membership card.
It has also been practiced to issue a D card to each customer and, at the time of this issuance, create a database of various information about each customer. However, also in this case, the stored information is only character information.

[0005]

As described above, computerization of product sales management and customer management is gradually progressing, but these are independent of each other, and are customer management and sales. It was not connected to management. For example, in a convenience store, who purchased the product was not so important, that is, what kind of product was sold to what kind of customer was not regarded as important information.

However, in some fields, it is very important information about what kind of product is sold to what kind of customer. For example, in the apparel industry, knowing which customer, that is, what kind of clothes the customer bought, what kind of product, that is, clothes, is very important in planning and selling clothes. It will be useful information. For that purpose, not only the character information but also the image is required.

The present invention has been made in view of the above points, and an object of the present invention is to enable management of information relating to products including images and information relating to customers in association with each other.

[0008]

In order to achieve the above object, an image storage management device according to the present invention includes a customer information storage unit for storing information about each customer together with image data of each customer, and for each product. The product information storage means for storing information about each product together with the image data, and one of the customer information storage means and the product information storage means are searched, and one of the information about the specific customer and the information about the specific product is retrieved. Based on the sales information stored in the sales information storage means, the information retrieval display means for displaying with an image, the sales information storage means for storing the sales information of each customer, and the customer information storage means, From the product information storage means, search for information about a specific customer and information about each product purchased by the customer, and respond with images. Customer display by - is characterized by comprising a product search display unit.

Further, the image storage management method according to the present invention is
Information about each customer is stored together with the image data of each customer, information about each product is stored together with the image data of each product, and the stored information is searched to obtain information about a specific customer and a specific product. One of the information of the above is displayed with an image, and the sales information of the product for each customer is accumulated. Based on the accumulated sales information, from the accumulated customer and product information, information about a specific customer is stored. It is characterized in that information about each product purchased by the customer is retrieved and displayed in association with each image.

[0010]

That is, according to the image storage management device and the image storage management method of the present invention, the image data of each customer and each product is stored in the customer information storage means and the product information storage means together with the information about each customer and each product. I'll do it. Then, the information search / display unit searches one of the customer information storage unit and the product information storage unit and displays one of the information about the specific customer and the information about the specific product with an image. Further, by storing the sales information of the products of each customer in the sales information storage means,
The product search and display means, based on the sales information accumulated in the sales information accumulating means, from the customer information accumulating means and the merchandise information accumulating means, information about a specific customer and information about each merchandise purchased by the customer. And are searched, and each is displayed with the corresponding image.

[0011]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. The present embodiment is applied to a small-scale apparel store for planning, manufacturing and retailing clothes. FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the configuration thereof, and an image generating section 10 images a product or a customer and generates image data. As the image generation unit 10, a card camera, such as a still memory camera, which electronically stores imaged image data in a storage medium such as a memory card can be used. This card camera is provided with a small color display such as a liquid crystal display for displaying the image data stored in the storage medium, and a color video printer or the like can be connected as necessary to print out the image data. Has been done.

The image data generated by the image generation unit 10 is supplied to an image storage management unit composed of, for example, a personal computer system. in this case,
The image data is supplied by removing the memory card 12 as a storage medium from the card camera, mounting the memory card 12 in the image input unit 14, for example, a card reader, and reading the stored contents. Alternatively, a small hard disk (HD) 16 may be used as a storage medium, or a wired 18 may be used for direct connection.

In this way, the image data input from the image input unit 14 is stored in the data storage unit 22 under the control of the processing unit 20. A medium such as a hard disk, a magneto-optical disk, or a laser disk can be used as the data storage unit 22. The data storage unit 22 is a customer information storage unit 24 for storing customer information, a product information storage unit 26 for storing product information, a sales information storage unit 28 for storing sales information, and others. The memo information storage unit 30 for storing various kinds of information.

The customer information storage section 24 stores the image data section 24 for each customer image data input by the image input section 14.
Information is stored in A, the link item part 24B, and the key item part 24C. That is, since only the image data stored in the image data section 24A is only a picture, key information such as name, address, and telephone number is used as a key to represent what kind of customer it belongs to. The data is stored in the item section 24C. This key information is written by the processing unit 20 according to the input operation of the key input unit 32 such as a keyboard. Further, since the image data 24A does not exist alone but may be associated with another picture or another file, that is, even if it is the image data of the same customer, an image of the whole body is obtained. , There are multiple images such as half-body images, face images, etc. If you do not link them, each image will be disjointed, so to follow it Link information is stored in the link item portion 24B. That is, this link information can connect the minimum related image information. This link information is processed by the processing unit 20 according to the input operation of the link input unit 34 such as a keyboard.
Written by.

Although not shown in the figure, the product information storage unit 26, like the customer information storage unit 24, also has the image input unit 1.
Information is stored in the image data part, the link item part, and the key item part for each image data of the product inputted by the step 4.

The sales information accumulating section 28 accumulates sales information as link information between the customer and the product and link information between the product and the customer. The link information 28A between the customer and the product is
This is information indicating the product S purchased by each customer K, and is stored for each customer K. Similarly, product and customer link information 28B
Is information indicating a customer who purchased each product, and is stored for each product. In other words, this sales information indicates that when there are several items of product information, the customer (S1) of the product sold to which customer K, and when the product S1 was sold to a certain customer K1. It is for accumulating things. This sales information is processed by the processing unit 20 according to the input operation of the sales information input unit 36 configured as a keyboard for manual input or a POS terminal for automatic input.
Written by.

The memo information accumulating section 30 accumulates various image data for reference, for example, images of buttons, patterns, magazines and the like. The processing section 20 is further connected to a customer identification input section 38, an instruction input section 40, a display section 42, and an image output section 44.

In order to retrieve and output the image of a customer who came to the store from the data storage unit 22, the customer specifying input unit 38 is to know who the customer is, that is, the name of the customer. It was prepared in view of the fact that it is necessary to quickly know the number of the person who came to the store. That is, even if you know that the image is stored, you can not use the information to identify the customer as a countermeasure against the fact that you cannot use it because you do not know the name of the customer. It is an input device. This can be, for example, a card reader or a bar code reader that reads information for identifying the customer from an ID card issued to the customer. Alternatively, it may be a keyboard or a voice input ten-key pad that allows a customer who visits the store to input an ID number. However, in this case, it is necessary to devise how to allow the customer to input his / her own ID number without any resistance.

[0019] For example, a store where you can take off your shoes and put on your slippers, and when a customer visits, "I will give you the slippers that I wore last time, so please tell me your ID number." Camouflage, that is, not to want to know information such as the name of the customer, but to make the customer think that it is necessary to enter the ID number because they want to put out slippers specially prepared for the customer It is conceivable to use slippers as a supplementary show to draw out ID numbers such as telephone numbers from customers.

The instruction input section 40 is a keyboard or mouse for instructing the processing section 20 to search the data in the data storage section 22, and the display section 42 is a CRT for displaying the search result. For example, a monitor.

The image output unit 44, contrary to the image input unit 14, is a card writer for writing the image data read from the data storage unit 22 into the memory card 12 as a storage medium. Alternatively, the image data may be written in a small HD 16 as a storage medium.

These memory card 12 or small HD 16
A storage medium such as is attached to the door-to-door sales tool 46. As the door-to-door sales tool 46, the card camera of the image generation unit 10 can be used as it is. That is, the image data electronically stored in the attached storage medium is displayed on a small color display such as a liquid crystal display, or if necessary, a color video printer or the like is connected to print out the image data. It can be used at customer's homes visited, other sales companies, retail stores, etc. to explain hot selling products. In other words, if there is data that has been stored and organized in the data storage unit 22, for example, the best selling clothes, rather than taking them outside, store those clothes in a storage medium such as the memory card 12. Obviously, it is much more bootable to drop the image and carry only it and the card camera. Of course, as the door-to-door sales tool 46, not only a card camera but also a small and lightweight computer called a so-called notebook computer can be used.

In the image storage management device having the above-described structure, an image is input, the image is registered in the computer, and if necessary, a search is performed to display individual information including the image. Alternatively, both images of the customer and the product can be displayed in association with each other so that the mutual relationship between the customer and the product is clear.

That is, when a large amount of data is stored in the data storage unit 22, the processing unit 20 searches the data storage unit 22 by entering an appropriate search condition from the instruction input unit 40, for example. The matching images and characters are displayed on the display unit 4 as a customer search enumeration display 50 as shown in FIG.
2 Display on top. The customer search enumeration display 50 is actually a display as shown in FIG.

Further, if one of the images in the customer search result listing 50 is designated from the instruction input section 40, or if the search is instructed by using the customer name or the like as a key, FIG.
As shown in, the search result is displayed as the customer information individual display 52. The customer information individual display 52 is actually as shown in FIG. 4 or FIG. In FIG. 4, an image of a face portion is captured as a customer image. FIG. 5 shows an image of the whole body captured, and the display can be switched to this display by clicking the item "Full body image" above the face image in FIG. 4 with a mouse, for example. In this way, if not only the face but the whole body is put in, it is easy to understand what kind of customer the customer wears. The items such as "full-body image" are displayed when there is a switchable image based on the link information set in the link item section 24B.

When a key for identifying a customer and an instruction to search for a product purchased by the customer are input from the instruction input unit 40, the processing unit 20 performs a search based on the sales information. As shown in FIG. 2, the result is displayed on the display unit 42 as a customer * product purchase display 54. This customer * merchandise purchase display 54 is actually a display as shown in FIG. In addition to the products purchased by the customer, if an image of the clothes worn by the customer is taken in every time the customer visits the store, it should be displayed together with those images as shown in FIGS. 7 and 8. You can also In this way, it becomes possible to give advice on product selection in consideration of the customer's coordination with clothes already owned by the customer.

As for the product, as in the case of the customer,
By appropriately inputting search conditions from the instruction input unit 40, the processing unit 20 searches the data storage unit 22 and displays the images and characters that match the conditions as the product search result enumeration display 56 as shown in FIG. It is displayed on the display unit 42. The product search result enumeration display 56 is actually a display as shown in FIG.

Further, if one of the images in the product search result listing display 56 is designated from the instruction input unit 40, or if the search is instructed by using the product name or the like as a key, FIG.
As shown in, the search result is displayed as the individual product information display 58. The product information individual display 58 is actually a display as shown in FIG. Also in this case, when there is a switchable image, those items are displayed.

Then, if a key for specifying a product and an instruction to search for a customer who purchased the product are input from the instruction input unit 40, the processing unit 20 performs a search based on the sales information. As shown in FIG. 2, the result is displayed on the display unit 42 as a product * customer purchase display 60.

In addition, various information such as button information, pattern information, street corner information, and measured information, which are helpful, are also stored in the data storage unit 22 as memo information, and can be searched. it can. That is, similar to the case of the customer or the product, for example, enumeration display as shown in FIG. 11 or individual display can be performed.

Here, the accumulation timing of the image data and the actual usage of the accumulated image data will be described with reference to a series of flowcharts shown in FIGS. 12 to 16.
That is, first, based on the information stored in the data storage unit 20,
The clothing as a product is planned and examined, and the clothing to be actually made is determined (step S1). That is, by referring to the product search enumeration display 56, the product information individual display 58, and the memo information display, it becomes possible to carry out planning with reference to past product images and magazine information.

Then, the clothes determined to be manufactured are created as a sample (ready-made clothes) (step S2), and this is photographed by the card camera of the image generator 10 (step S).
3). Image data of the product obtained by photographing in this way is input from the image input unit 14, and link information and key information are input from the link input unit 34 and the key input unit 32.
It is registered in the product information storage unit 26 of the data storage unit 22 (step S4).

Next, referring to the customer search enumeration display 50, the customer information individual display 52 and the customer * product purchase display 54, a direct mail (DM) for a limited customer is created and sent (step S55). . At this time, the product image can be dropped from the image output unit 44 to the door-to-door sales tool 46 and printed out by a video printer or the like and used for DM.

When the customer actually visits the store (step S6), the customer identification input section 38 is input to search the data storage section 22 for the customer information individual display 5
2, customer * product purchase display 54 is performed (step S
7). This will give you an overview of your customers
Even if the person in charge of the customer is absent, it is possible to respond appropriately. Next, the card camera of the image generation unit 10 photographs the customer to commemorate the store visit, prints it out with a video printer, and presents it to the customer (step S8). Then, the customer is asked whether he / she wants to visit the store, that is, whether to purchase ready-made clothes or to make clothes by easy order or made-to-order (step S9).

When the customer visits the store for the purpose of purchasing ready-made clothes (step S10), referring to the customer * merchandise purchase display 54, according to the image of the customer's past purchased clothes and shop clothes, and again, According to the request this time, an appropriate product is shown to the customer, and the customer is asked to select the desired product (step S11). Then, if there is a desired product, the person actually tries on the clothes (step S12), photographs the appearance, and prints it out with a video printer (step S).
13). That is, the printout can be used as a substitute for a normal mirror, and moreover, it is possible to easily compare the appearance of trying on a plurality of products. Further, even if the product is out of stock, it is possible to show the image of the product printed out to the customer so that the product can be added to the options. This makes it possible to target sold-out or past products.

In this way, when the product to be purchased is determined (step S14), the size, customer name,
When necessary items such as an address, a telephone number, a product name, a material, and an amount of money are entered (step S15), the payment is received (step S16), and the product is handed to the customer (step S1).
7) The customer returns home with the product (step S1).
8). Here, since the customer information individual display 52 can be referred to when the sales form is filled in, necessary items can be filled in, so that it is not necessary to ask the customer for a name or the like.

After the customer returns home, customer management processing is performed (step S19). That is, the storage medium, for example, the memory card 12 is taken out from the card camera of the image generation unit 10, set in the card reader of the image input unit 14, and the image data is input to the data storage unit 22. Then, the customer search enumeration display 50 including the image data, the customer information individual display 52, the customer * product purchase display 54, etc. are displayed, and while looking at this display and the sales form filled in above, the link input section 34, the key Input unit 32, sales information input unit 36, etc.
In other words, operate the keyboard to enter the required data.

Of course, if the data is directly read from the bar code of the customer's ID card or product tag,
It is not necessary to fill in the sales form, and the amount of data input in this customer management process can be greatly reduced.

On the other hand, when the customer who visits the store wants an easy order (step S10), the customer * product purchase display 54 is referred to, and according to the image of the customer's past purchase clothes and store clothes, According to the customer's request this time, the customer is presented with sample products for easy order, and the customer is asked to select the desired sample (step S20).

If there is a desired sample, the sample is photographed (step S21). In addition, after measuring various dimensions of the customer (step S22), necessary items such as measurement data, customer name, address, telephone number, product name, cloth, amount, internal payment, and delivery date are entered in the order form (step S23). ). Further, for example, the customer is photographed as a commemoration of purchase, printed out by a video printer, and presented to the customer (step S24). Then, upon receipt of the payment of the price or the internal payment (step S25), the customer receives a product exchange slip or the like (step S26), and the customer returns home with it (step S27). Here, when the order form is filled, the customer information individual display 52 is referred to, so that the necessary items can be filled, so that the customer can save the trouble of asking the name and the like.

After the customer returns home, customer management processing is performed (step S28). That is, the storage medium, for example, the memory card 12 is taken out from the card camera of the image generation unit 10, set in the card reader of the image input unit 14, and the image data is input to the data storage unit 22. Then, the customer search enumeration display 50 including the image data, the customer information individual display 52, the customer * product purchase display 54, etc. are displayed, and while looking at this display and the sales form filled in above, the link input section 34, the key Input unit 32, sales information input unit 36, etc.
In other words, operate the keyboard to enter the required data.

Of course, if the data is directly read from the bar code of the customer's ID card or product tag,
It is not necessary to fill in the sales form, and the amount of data input in this customer management process can be greatly reduced. If there is measurement data for clothes purchased in the past, the measurement can be partially omitted.

Then, the garment is produced based on the order form (step S29), and when the garment is completed, it is notified to the customer, or the planned completion date (delivery date) is notified to the customer (step S30). Here, if the customer can confirm the date and time of coming to the store, the customer's face and name can be confirmed in advance by the customer information individual display 52. Therefore, when the customer comes to the store to get the completed clothes (step S31), the search like the above step S7 becomes unnecessary. Of course, when the clerk in charge is absent, an appropriate response can be taken by performing the search in step S7.

Then, the customer who visits the store tries on the completed clothes (step S32), photographs the appearance, prints it out with a video printer, and presents it to the customer (step S33). Then, after the clothes are packaged and given to the customer (step S34), the customer returns home with the clothes (step S35).

After the customer returns home, customer management processing is performed (step S36). That is, the storage medium, for example, the memory card 12 is taken out from the card camera of the image generation unit 10, set in the card reader of the image input unit 14, and the try-on image data is input to the data storage unit 22. Then, a customer search enumeration display 50 including the image data and a customer information individual display 5
2, the customer * product purchase display 54, etc. is displayed, and while looking at this display and the sales form filled in above, the link input section 3
4, the key input unit 32, the sales information input unit 36, etc., that is, the keyboard is operated to input necessary data.

On the other hand, when the customer who visits the store wants an order (step S10), the product search enumeration display 56,
The product information individual display 58, memo information and the like are shown to the customer, and if necessary, printed out to consult with the customer about the design (step S37). That is, it is possible to make proposals using past product designs. When the final design is determined (step S38), the process proceeds to step S22, and the above-described processing after the measurement is performed.

Although the final design is not decided,
If some candidates are narrowed down (step S38), the customer is photographed and the image is taken into the data storage unit via the image input unit 14 (step S39). Then, a dress-up simulation is performed using the image of the customer and the image of the candidate design to determine the design desired by the customer (step S40). In this way, when the design is determined (step S413), the process proceeds to step S22, and the above-described processing after the measurement is performed. Therefore, since the customer shows only the image captured in step S39 as the image of the customer, it is not known that the image captured at any other timing is used for customer management.

It should be noted that, in order to store the images of the customers, instead of photographing the customers who have visited the store one by one, it is efficient if, for example, an ordering party is held for the upper customers and the customers are gathered and photographed intensively. Is.

As described above, if the images are stored and managed, the following various effects are expected. In other words, by shooting and accumulating the clothes worn by the customer,
By inputting the customer's ID number or the like, it is possible to continuously understand what kind of clothes the customer wears. You can see what your customers like and what clothes you have.
That is, more powerful information can be stored.

Further, by performing such image storage management, it is possible to change a store into a corporate form.
In other words, the fact that customer data is managed and accumulated means, for example, as a company, what kind of customer the customer who came to the store manages even if a certain clerk is absent or has changed. It becomes possible to handle customer information as corporate data.

Further, there is an effect that coordinated sales can be performed while viewing past purchase information. In addition, in general, when shooting a full-body image of a customer, it is common to hold the camera vertically and shoot.
The image stored in the storage medium, that is, the image displayed on the CRT display is an image lying sideways after being rotated by 90 °. Therefore, the vertical / horizontal conversion is performed at the stage of being stored in the data storage unit 22 from the image input unit 14 and stored, or the vertical / horizontal conversion is performed at the stage of being retrieved from the data storage unit 22 and displayed on the display unit 42. Need to go and view.
Whether to perform this vertical / horizontal conversion can be determined by an instruction from the instruction input unit 40. Further, for example, it is more preferable to automatically determine the vertical / horizontal direction from the image of the clothes in the image or the position of the person's face to determine whether to perform the vertical / horizontal conversion. That is, as long as the image data is limited to clothes or clothes products and customers, a human body feature such as a face always exists in the long-axis direction, so that it is possible to determine the vertical / horizontal direction by contour extraction or the like. To use. Further, if the determination is made only for the face, it is possible to determine the top and bottom from the face and the hair. Similarly, in the case of a product image, clothes such as skirts and pants have considerably different image characteristics at the top and bottom, and thus it is easy to distinguish the top and bottom.

When the key item includes the item of height, it is possible to automatically measure the height and obtain the item information by extracting the contour from the photographed image. Of course, the image data may be compressed and stored.

[0053]

According to the present invention, it becomes possible to manage the information about the product including the image and the information about the customer in association with each other.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing various search results.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an actual display example of a customer search enumeration display in FIG.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an actual display example of individual customer information display in FIG.

5 is a diagram showing another display example of individual customer information display in FIG.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an actual display example of a customer * product purchase display in FIG.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing another display example of a customer * product purchase display in FIG.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing still another display example of the customer * product purchase display in FIG.

FIG. 9 is a diagram showing an actual display example of a product search result enumeration display in FIG.

10 is a diagram showing an actual display example of individual product information display in FIG.

FIG. 11 is a diagram showing an actual display example of a memo information enumeration display.

FIG. 12 is a diagram showing a first part of a series of flowcharts for explaining a storage timing of image data and an actual usage method of the stored image data.

FIG. 13 is a diagram showing a second part of a series of flowcharts for explaining the storage timing of image data and the actual usage of the stored image data.

FIG. 14 is a diagram showing a third part of a series of flowcharts for explaining the accumulation timing of image data and the actual usage of the accumulated image data.

FIG. 15 is a diagram showing a fourth part of a series of flowcharts for explaining the accumulation timing of image data and the actual usage of the accumulated image data.

FIG. 16 is a diagram showing a fifth part of a series of flowcharts for explaining the accumulation timing of image data and the actual usage of the accumulated image data.

[Explanation of symbols]

10 ... Image generation unit, 12 ... Memory card, 14 ... Image input unit, 16 ... Small hard disk, 18 ... Wired, 20 ...
Processing unit, 22 ... Data storage unit, 24 ... Customer information storage unit, 2
4A ... Image data section, 24B ... Link item section, 24C ...
Key item section, 26 ... Merchandise information storage section, 28 ... Sales information storage section, 28A ... Customer and merchandise link information, 28B ...
Link information between products and customers, 30 ... Memo information storage unit, 32
... key input unit, 34 ... link input unit, 36 ... sales information input unit, 38 ... customer specifying input unit, 40 ... instruction input unit,
42 ... Display unit, 44 ... Image output unit, 46 ... Door-to-door sales tool.

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (51) Int.Cl. ⁶ Identification code Internal reference number FI technical display location 8125-5L G06F 15/62 P

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A customer information storage unit that stores information about each customer together with image data of each customer, a product information storage unit that stores information about each product together with image data of each product, and the customer information storage unit. And information retrieval display means for searching one of the product information storage means and displaying one of the information about a specific customer and the information about a specific product with an image and the sales information of the product for each customer. Based on the sales information accumulating means for performing the sales information accumulating means, and the customer information accumulating means and the product information accumulating means based on the sales information accumulated in the sales information accumulating means. An image storage comprising: a customer-commodity search display means for searching information and displaying each in association with an image. Management device. 2. Information about each customer is accumulated together with image data of each customer, information about each commodity is accumulated together with image data of each commodity, and the accumulated information is searched to obtain information about a specific customer. And one of the information about the specific product is displayed with an image, and the sales information of the product for each customer is accumulated. Based on the accumulated sales information, the specific information is displayed from the accumulated customer and product information. An image storage and management method, characterized in that information about a customer and information about each product purchased by the customer are retrieved and displayed in association with each other.