This is the U.S. National Stage of PCT/AU2007/001829 filed Nov. 29, 2007, and relates to Australian Application No. 2006906711, filed Dec. 1, 2006, the entire contents of both applications are incorporated herein by reference in their entireties.
The present invention relates to a carrier tray for cups, beverage bottles and like containers for liquids. The present invention also relates to a blank from which the tray can be folded and associated methods.
Such carrier trays are widely used to enable patrons to take away coffee or alcoholic beverages from cafes, liquor outlets at sporting stadia, and the like. Such carrier trays are either given away free or sold for a nominal price and so must be relatively inexpensive to manufacture. One class of carrier trays are those moulded from either plastics material or cellulose pulp. The other class of carrier tray are those folded from planar sheet material, (typically cardboard) and the present invention is particularly concerned with this class of carrier tray.
In order to reduce costs in fabricating such a carrier tray, it is highly desirable to enable the entire tray to be folded from a single blank formed from a single sheet of planar material such as cardboard. In particular, it is desirable to avoid steps such as gluing which are required to attach two or more pieces of cardboard together to fabricate some arrangements.
The genesis of the present invention is a desire to produce a carrier tray from such a blank, to produce the blank, and to provide the methods of folding to enable the carrier tray to be folded from the blank and for the blank to be re-configured between transport and assembly configurations.
In accordance with the first aspect of the present invention there is disclosed a carrier tray for cups, beverage bottles, and like containers for liquids, said tray being folded from a substantially planar blank and comprising a base, an upper deck spaced from said base and including at least one container receiving aperture, side walls extending between said base and upper deck, and a carrying handle extending above said upper deck.
In accordance with the second aspect of the present invention there is disclosed a planar blank for a carrier tray for cups, beverage bottles and like containers for liquids, said blank comprising:
In accordance with the third aspect of the present invention there is disclosed a method of folding the abovementioned planar blank to form the abovementioned carrier tray, said method comprising the steps of:
In accordance with the fourth aspect of the present invention there is disclosed a method of folding the abovementioned planar blank into a folded transport configuration, the method comprising the steps of:
In accordance with the fifth aspect of the present invention there is disclosed a method of unfolding the abovementioned planar blank from a folded transport configuration to a planar assembly configuration, said method comprising the steps of reversing steps (ii) and (i) above, in that order.
A preferred embodiment of the present invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:
As seen in
Extending between the base portions 2, 3 and the upper deck 5 are respective side walls 12, 13. A carrying handle 15 is provided and is formed from two like generally U-shaped handle portions 22, 23 which extend upwardly from the base portions 2, 3 respectively through a handle receiving slot 16. In addition, each handle portion 22, 23 has a corresponding quasi-triangular brace 32, 33 which swings outwardly from the corresponding handle portion into a central opening 18 in the upper deck 5. This movement of the braces 32, 33 enlarges a finger receiving opening 17 in the carrying handle 15.
The central opening 18 is provided with four fold down walls 25-28 each of which has a Z-shaped configuration and each of which has a latching tongue 35-38 which is retained in the base of a corresponding L-shaped slot 45-48 in the side walls 12, 13.
Turning now to
In order to convert the blank 11 into the carrier tray 1, first the handle portions 22 and 23 are folded downwardly into the plane of the page as seen in
Next the central opening 18 is enlarged by folding downwardly each of the fold down walls 25-28 until the corresponding tongues 35-38 are latched into and retained by the base of the corresponding slots 45-48. Once this has been completed, the braces 32, 33 are able to be swung towards their adjacent corresponding side walls 12, 13 so as to enlarge the finger receiving opening 17 from the small size illustrated in
In this configuration the carrier tray 1 is able to accommodate four coffee cups, or the like, one in each of the four container receiving apertures 6-9. In addition, the enlarged central opening 18 is able to accommodate miscellaneous items such as drinking straws, a personal wallet, edible substances such as candy bars, finger buns, pastries, and so on.
Turning now to
This process is continued by folding the upper deck 5 about the handle receiving slot 16 so as to abut the handle portions 22 and 23 and place the blank 11 into the configurations seen in
Clearly, to convert from the transport configuration to the open configuration required prior to assembly and as illustrated in
The above described embodiment has many advantages. Firstly, the blank 11 is able to be fabricated inexpensively and the carrier tray 1 is able to be created therefrom without any gluing or other manufacturing steps. The blank 11 can contain advertising and is easily fabricated from a grade of cardboard so as to be sufficiently strong to carry the appreciable weight of four drinks and miscellaneous items, edible or otherwise, within the central opening 18.
Furthermore, the carrying handle 15 is extremely convenient and enables the entire load to be carried in a single hand with the fingers passing through the finger receiving opening 17. The handle 15 is strengthened by the braces 32, 33 and these also provide a sufficiently sturdy arrangement to enable unbalanced loads to be carried.
To summarize, there is disclosed a carrier tray for cups, beverage bottles, and like containers for liquids, the tray being folded from a substantially planar blank and comprising a base, an upper deck spaced from the base and including at least one container receiving aperture, side walls extending between the base and upper deck, and a carrying handle extending above the upper deck.
Preferably the carrying handle is formed from two abutting and like shaped portions of the blank.
Preferably the base is formed from two spaced apart portions and the carrying handle portions are interposed between the base portions and extend through a handle receiving slot in the upper deck.
Preferably the side walls comprise a pair of walls each of which joins the upper deck to a corresponding one of the base portions.
Preferably the carrying handle has a finger receiving opening formed by a swing out brace portion which abuts one of the base portions.
Preferably each handle portion has a corresponding swing out brace portion.
Preferably the upper deck includes a plurality of the container receiving apertures arranged symmetrically relative to the carrying handle, and the upper deck further includes a central opening within which the swing out brace(s) pivot.
Preferably the upper deck central opening includes a plurality of fold down walls which extend to the base.
There is also disclosed a planar blank for a carrier tray for cups, beverage bottles and like containers for liquids, the blank comprising:
Preferably the upper deck portion includes a central opening having four fold down walls.
Preferably the central opening is substantially rectangular and has a longitudinal axis which is substantially perpendicular to the handle receiving slot.
Preferably the upper deck portion includes four of the container receiving apertures each of which has a plurality of radially extending fingers.
Preferably each of the handle portions is generally U-shaped and has a generally triangular swing out brace.
In addition there is disclosed a method of folding the planar blank above to form above the carrier tray, the method comprising the steps of:
Preferably the method includes the further step of:
Preferably the method includes the further step of:
Still further there is also disclosed a method of folding the above planar blank into a folded transport configuration, the method comprising the steps of:
Similarly, there is also disclosed a method of unfolding the above planar blank from a folded transport configuration to a planar assembly configuration, the method comprising the steps of:
reversing steps (ii) and (i) in that order of the last mentioned method.
The foregoing describes only one embodiment of the present invention and modifications, obvious to those skilled in the cardboard folding arts, can be made thereto without departing from the scope of the present invention. For example, the L shaped slots 45 and 48 can be provided as a pair of spaced apart slots one vertical and one horizontal in the assembled tray.
The term “comprising” (and its grammatical variations) as used herein is used in the inclusive sense of “including” or “having” and not in the exclusive sense of “consisting only of”.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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2006906711 | Dec 2006 | AU | national |
Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind | 371c Date |
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PCT/AU2007/001829 | 11/29/2007 | WO | 00 | 8/11/2010 |
Publishing Document | Publishing Date | Country | Kind |
---|---|---|---|
WO2008/064414 | 6/5/2008 | WO | A |
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2004067393 | Aug 2004 | WO |
Entry |
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International Search Report & Written Opinion mailed Jan. 10, 2008 of PCT/AU2007/001829 filed Nov. 29, 2007 (6 pages). |
Number | Date | Country | |
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20100320114 A1 | Dec 2010 | US |