Patent ID: 7720724

Claim:
An inventory management method for managing inventories of articles for an organization using a computer, the method comprising: storing management information on a first inventory of articles, including information identifying articles and first salespersons of a department within the organization designated to sell each respective article in a predetermined storage device; specifying in said predetermined storage device, information indicating inclusion of an article from the first inventory of articles to a second inventory of articles, where the second inventory of articles allows second salespersons of other departments within the organization who have not purchased the article to sell articles included in the second inventory of articles; and for the article specified to be included in the second inventory, storing information accessible by said second salespersons indicating the article is included in the second inventory in the storage device as the management information; and storing, for the article specified to be included in the second inventory, information of profitability indicated by a rate of profit to be obtained when a seller sells the article relative to the selling price of the article, and a lower-limit inventory unit cost value; and in response to a status that the article is sold, calculating a profit for said second salesperson obtained by selling the article the profitability, and calculating a profit for said first salesperson based on the lower-limit inventory unit cost value.