1. A method of providing personalized transactional benefits at a point of purchase over a network based on personalized identification information provided by a consumer and stored at a first server, the first server also having stored thereat a plurality of product identification numbers which are used to identify articles of commerce, each article of commerce bearing an indicia on which one product identification number is encoded, the method comprising the steps of: providing a code symbol reader, operably connected to the first server of the network, for scanning the indicia on the product, the indicia being associated with the product identification number, the code symbol reader including a personalized identifier to identify the consumer; reading at least a portion of the indicia on the article of commerce using the code symbol reader; retrieving from the first server the product identification number associated with the indicia on the article of commerce; processing the at least one personalized identifier of the consumer and retrieving from the first server the personalized identification information provided by the consumer; displaying at least one of pricing information, purchasing options, and product information for the article of commerce; and offering personalized transactional benefits for the purchase of the article of commerce based on the personalized identification information provided by the consumer.