1. An apparatus for characterization of areas of consultant expertise of consultants, the apparatus comprising: means for obtaining information on how recently a consultant purchased products of a given category, and how often the consultant purchased the products; means for determining whether consultant advice given has been found by shoppers to be relevant and helpful in the past; means for determining a willingness and capability of each consultant to give advice, based on physical proximity, current workload and explicitly stated desire; and means for assigning a score to each consultant based on the information, willingness and capability.