Patent Document ID: 20070262149
Application ID: 11729659
Patent Status: 0

Claim One:
1. A method of identifying a consumer product in a retail store environment when a bar code symbol on a product is not readable or has been removed from the product's packaging, said method comprising the steps of: (a) providing a digital image capturing and processing system in said retail environment; (b) using said digital image capturing and processing system to capture a plurality of digital images for each consumer product sold in said retail store environment, and storing said digital images in a database subsystem, along with product identifying information for each consumer product; and (c) when a consumer checks out a consumer product at the POS station in said retail store environment, an attempts is made to identify consumer product by capturing and processing one or more digital images of the consumer product using said digital image capturing and processing system so as to read the bar code symbol label on its packing, and when the imaged bar code symbol happens to be unreadable, or when the bar code symbol label happens to have fallen off or have been removed from the packaging, then said digital image capturing and processing system uses (i) said one or more digital images of said consumer product, and (ii) said plurality digital images stored in said database subsystem, to assist in the identification of said consumer product.