JP2018502790A - Packaging material and method of using the packaging material - Google Patents

Abstract

Packaging material having a chamber, wherein the chamber contains a plurality of corresponding products, the product is dimensioned such that such a number of products almost completely fills the chamber, and at least one of the packaging materials can be removed The removable part is dimensioned so that the at least one removable part can be removed from the packaging material, rearranged to take an expanded shape, and disposed in the room, so that a plurality of removable parts are provided. Has the effect of reducing the volume of the available chamber for the product by n times the volume of the product to be stored, while maintaining the feature that such a product almost completely fills the chamber, where n is an integer. ,Packaging materials.

Description

  The present invention relates to a packaging material having a chamber for accommodating a plurality of corresponding products, in particular products made to order.

  When products are manufactured in the factory, often a plurality of products are packaged together in order to facilitate handling. This is especially true when the products to be manufactured are relatively small, such as consumables. In particular, when a factory manufactures various types of products, it is typical to package a single type of product group together. This is because it is simpler and more cost effective. For example, if the product is a food product, a group of products with the same flavor or recipe may be packaged together.

  Occasionally, factories provide assorted types of packaging that include various types in a single group packaging. However, such assortments are generally intended for sale to consumers and may be packaged together in group packaging.

  Such product groups can then be conveniently shipped to wholesalers or more recently to e-commerce distributors.

  Under normal circumstances, the wholesaler sells the product group packed in the factory to the retailer in the factory package. Typically, the retailer then removes the product from the group package for sale.

  However, delivery companies may want to provide tailor-made services to online consumers. In such a scenario, the delivery company prepares a custom order and takes the product from the packaging material at the factory before packaging the custom order for delivery to the consumer.

  In particular, for some types of products, the delivery company may want to give the general public the possibility of choosing the kind of combination that the general public wants to deliver to their home. is there. In this case, the ordered type is selected by the delivery company according to the order, and the tailor-made orders are placed in new packaging material and delivered to the consumer.

  Since the order is made to order, the number of products to be packaged by the courier is necessarily different from the number of products present in the group package.

  In this case, packaging material from a factory that groups together the same type of product is no longer considered useful to the shipper and is discarded. Thereafter, the delivery company prepares custom-made orders using their own packaging materials, and the packaging materials may be selected based on the order size. This is a waste of factory group packaging.

  For example, in a typical pick-by-light system, a sorting sequence is initiated at the beginning of an area where an operator scans a barred label attached to a delivery carton or package. . The display informs the operator how many of each product should be sorted.

  Pick-to-light systems that are widely used in the industry result in many packaging material wastes. This is because the packaging material used from the factory is removed and discarded before the product is placed in the pick-to-light rack. The picker then has boxes of different sizes, often for different order quantities, for example packaging boxes for 5 products, boxes for 10 products, 15 for packaging consumer orders. Use new packaging material with boxes for individual products.

  Patent document 1 discloses the transport packaging for manufacturing the stackable display packaging material, and in this case, a part of the packaging material can be inserted into the packaging material.

  U.S. Patent No. 6,057,031 discloses a combined carrier carton that can be repositioned to provide a slot in a container for receiving a divider.

International Publication No. 2011/32735 Canadian Patent No. 2010833

  In a first aspect, the invention relates to a packaging material having a chamber, wherein the chamber contains a plurality of corresponding products, the products are dimensioned such that such number of products almost completely fills the chamber, The packaging material comprises at least one removable part, the removable part is dimensioned such that the at least one removable part can be removed from the packaging material, repositioned to assume an expanded shape, and Is arranged to reduce the volume of the chamber available for the product by n times the volume of the product to be stored, while maintaining the feature that the plurality of products almost completely fill the chamber. , N is an integer.

  Thus, the present invention provides that the packaging material can be substantially filled with a plurality of corresponding products and that the packaging material can be emptied and filled again with a smaller number of corresponding products. The remaining space in the room is filled by the presence of at least one removable part. As such, the packaging material can be used to deliver a group package packed at the factory to the delivery company. The courier will then remove the contents of the packaging material, empty the packaging material, and re-contain the container, even if the ordered product is a number of products that do not meet the packaging material, in order to wrap the custom order. Can be used.

  “Substantially completely fills the chamber” means that a sufficient number of products fit snugly within the packaging material, leaving no freedom of movement for the contained products.

  The term “removable” means a feature that allows the removable part to be removed cleanly and neatly from the packaging material, for example by pulling the removable part away from the body of the packaging material without causing damage to the packaging material or the removable part. This means that the removable part is provided.

  The present invention has particular applicability for ordering custom made consumer products such as coffee products or tea products, preferably tea leaves, which are contained in capsules for extraction by a beverage machine, for example.

  Each removable part preferably reduces the volume available by 1-30 products, more preferably 1-14 products, most preferably 2-6 products.

  The packaging material may be formed from a wide variety of materials, but is generally formed from cardboard and can have a generally flat shape for storage.

  The packaging material may take various shapes and sizes, but generally the chamber is a parallelepiped.

  The product may take a variety of shapes and sizes, but generally the product is a parallelepiped.

  Preferably, removal of the removable part does not change the available volume of the chamber.

  The removable part preferably forms at least part of one side of the packaging material, preferably part or all of the top surface of the packaging material. Preferably, each of the at least one removable part is a flat sheet of cardboard with a pre-fold.

  The packaging material may have any number of removable parts as required, but the present invention is particularly effective when the number of removable parts is 1 to 4, preferably 2. I found out.

  In one particular embodiment, there are two removable parts, which form between them almost the entire surface of the packaging material.

  At least one removable part is preferably attached to the packaging material by a weakened area, preferably perforations.

  As described above, the packaging material contains a plurality of corresponding products. Thus, in the first preferred embodiment, the packaging material is filled with a plurality of corresponding products. For example, this is the situation where the packaging material is away from the factory, preferably all of the same type.

  In this embodiment, the packaging material chamber preferably contains 4 to 100 products, preferably 6 to 50 products, more preferably 10 to 30 products, before volume reduction. This number of products means that tailor-made orders for any number of products can be more easily filled by the reduced volume provided by the removable part.

  It has been found that the invention is particularly effective when the product is parallelepiped and the product is dimensioned such that the number of such products almost completely fills the chamber.

  Thus, in a subsequent preferred embodiment, the packaging material is filled with a combination of a plurality of corresponding products and at least one removable part in its expanded shape. Preferably, the product comprises a plurality of different types, for example a plurality of different tea leaf types.

  In a preferred embodiment, each removable portion can take the form of a plurality of expanded shapes, preferably two expanded shapes, each expanded shape reducing the volume of the chamber by a different amount. In a particularly preferred embodiment, each removable part can take a first expanded shape with a volume of two products and a second expanded shape with a volume of four products.

In a second aspect, the present invention relates to a method of preparing a packaging material for a tailor-made product for a consumer who has made a tailor-made order, the method comprising:
a. Obtaining a packaging material as described herein containing a plurality of products;
b. Removing a plurality of products from the packaging material;
c. Adding a number of types of products less than the number removed in step b to the packaging material according to a custom order;
d. Removing at least one removable part from the packaging material;
e. Reposition the removed removable part to take an expanded shape and place the removable part in the packaging material to reduce the volume between the number of products removed and the number of products added. And filling the difference.

  The present invention will now be described by way of example with reference to the following figures.

FIG. 4 is a diagram of a packaging material according to the present invention that houses a plurality of corresponding products. FIG. 2 is an illustration of the packaging material shown in FIG. 1 with one panel removed. FIG. 3 is a view of the packaging material shown in FIG. 2 with the second panel removed. FIG. 4 is an illustration of the packaging material of FIG. 3 with the removed panels adjacent. FIG. 5 is a view of the packaging material of FIG. 4 with the product removed and one of the removed panels rearranged. FIG. 6 is a view of the packaging material of FIG. 5 with the rearranged panels disposed within the packaging material. FIG. 7 is an illustration of the packaging material of FIG. 6 with a plurality of corresponding products arranged in the packaging material. FIG. 8 is a view of the packaging material of FIG. 7 where a new cover is added to perform hermetic packaging. It is a schematic plan view of the packaging material which accommodates several corresponding products. FIG. 5 is a schematic plan view of a packaging material containing 14 corresponding products with a repositioning packaging element added. FIG. 2 is a schematic plan view of two packaging materials containing 12 corresponding products with one or two repositioning packaging elements added. FIG. 6 is a schematic plan view of a packaging material containing 10 corresponding products with a repositioning packaging element added. FIG. 4 is a schematic plan view of a packaging material containing eight corresponding products with two repositioning packaging elements added.

  Referring to the figure, as shown in FIG. 1, in a tea factory, capsules containing tea leaves are packaged in a parallelepiped package 1 or carton, each package or carton containing multiple capsules of the same type of tea leaves. Accommodate. Sixteen such parallelepiped cartons are arranged in parallel hexahedral packaging material 2 or case according to the present invention in two adjacent rows of eight packages. For example, the packaging material can contain 16 packages, each of which contains 12 tea leaf capsules, all of which are of the same tea leaf type. As shown, the sixteen packages almost completely fill the packaging material chamber so that none of the packages can move freely within the packaging material.

  Case lid is closed but not sealed / taped. The case is then placed on a pallet and sent to the packer.

  In the packer, as shown in FIGS. 2 to 4, the packer removes the case from the pallet and “strips” the perforated lid flaps 4 and 6 from the case. Reserve a flap for the rest. The case is then placed on the back of the pick-to-light rack with the product still in the case (saving time and minimizing product handling).

  When a bespoke order is taken, in front of the pick-to-light rack, the picker uses an empty case (pre-emptied) as shown in FIG. Sort tea leaves.

  If the consumer orders 16 cartons, no case fit is required since the case is originally dimensioned for 16 cartons. The consumer can order 8, 10, 12, 14, 16 in multiples of 2 from 8 to 16, for example.

  In order to fill the void / space in the case, the picker reuses the previously removed lid flaps 4, 6 and folds the lid flaps along the perforated perforations into the case. insert. As shown in FIG. 5, the lid flaps 4, 6 have specific perforations so that they can be folded to fill four or two carton cavities. As shown in FIGS. 5 and 6, one flap is folded to occupy the volume of four cartons of tea leaves.

  As shown in FIG. 7, the 12 custom-made cartons fill the remaining volume of packaging material. When the order is complete, a new fine lid is placed over the case as shown in FIG. 8 and is bundled with the consumer's mailing label, ready to be sent to the consumer. Thus, the packaging material retains the characteristic that a plurality of such products, in this case 12 products, almost completely fill the packaging material chamber.

  With this arrangement, all possible orders from 8, 10, 12, 14, 16 can be accepted. FIG. 9 shows the arrangement when there are orders for 16 cartons, FIG. 10 is for 14 cartons, and FIG. 11 is two different possible configurations for 12 cartons. FIG. 12 shows a configuration for 10 cartons and FIG. 13 shows a configuration for 8 cartons. In any case, all of the available volume of packaging material is filled with the product 1 or the combination of expansion flaps 4,6.

1 carton (package)
2 Packaging materials (case)
4,6 lid flap

Claims (15)

  A packaging material having a chamber, the chamber containing a plurality of corresponding products, the product being dimensioned such that such a number of products almost completely fills the chamber, wherein the packaging material is at least One removable part, the removable part being dimensioned so that the at least one removable part can be removed from the packaging material, repositioned to assume an expanded shape, and in the chamber Arrangement has the effect of reducing the volume of the chamber available for the product by n times the volume of the product to be accommodated while maintaining the feature that a plurality of the products almost completely fill the chamber. And n is an integer.   The packaging material according to claim 1, wherein each removable part reduces the volume available by 1 to 30 products, more preferably 1 to 14 products, and most preferably 2 to 6 products.   The packaging material according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the chamber is a parallelepiped.   The packaging material according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the product is a parallelepiped.   The packaging material according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein removal of the removable part does not change the available volume of the chamber.   The packaging material according to any one of claims 1 to 5, wherein the removable part forms one side of the packaging material, preferably at least a part of the top surface of the packaging material.   The packaging material according to any one of claims 1 to 6, wherein each removable part is a flat sheet of cardboard having a prior fold.   The packaging material according to any one of claims 1 to 7, wherein the number of the removable parts is 1 to 4, preferably 2.   9. The packaging material according to any one of claims 1 to 8, wherein each removable part is attached to the packaging material by a fragile region, preferably a perforation.   10. A packaging material according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein each removable part can take the form of a plurality of expanded shapes, each expanded shape reducing the volume of the chamber by a different size.   11. A packaging material according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein the chamber is filled with a plurality of corresponding products, preferably all of the same type of product.   12. A packaging material according to claim 11, wherein the chamber contains 4 to 100 products, preferably 6 to 50 products, more preferably 10 to 30 products.   11. A packaging according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein the packaging material is filled with a combination of a plurality of corresponding products, preferably comprising a plurality of types, and at least one removable part having an expanded shape. Materials.   14. Packaging material according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein each corresponding product comprises a beverage material, preferably tea leaves or coffee, more preferably tea leaf capsules. A method for preparing packaging materials for tailor-made products according to consumers who have made a tailor-made order,
a. Obtaining a packaging material according to any one of claims 1 to 14 containing a plurality of products;
b. Removing a plurality of products from the packaging material;
c. Adding a number of types of products less than the number removed in step b to the packaging material according to a custom order;
d. Removing at least one removable part from the packaging material;
e. Repositioning the removed removable parts in an expanded shape and placing the removable parts in the packaging material to determine the number of products removed and the number of added products. Filling the volume difference between,
A method comprising the steps of:

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