The field of the invention is shopping and the object of the invention is to provide a shopping bin which relieves the shopper from the burden of having to manually unload the items from a shopping cart and depositing them on the conveyor of a supermarket check stand. Another object of the invention is to provide such a bin that requires the very minimum of modifications to a conventional bin for this invention to perform its duty. A further object of the invention is to provide such a bin that can be stacked one inside the other in nesting fashion and therefore require minimal storage space. A still further object of the invention is to provide such a bin that in operation requires absolutely no modification to existing shopping carts or to existing check stands.
As technology has evolved the general trend in shopping market layout has been toward conveyor belt check stands with most stores requiring the customers to unload items from their shopping carts onto the belt which then moves the items to the checker who manually passes the items by a scanner for identification and pricing. One of the problems with such a system is that most customers would prefer not to be burdened by the task of unloading each item from their cart. Another related problem from the customer's perspective is that while they are occupied by the task of unloading the cart their attention is diverted from the register display showing prices as the checker scans items. A problem with the system from the stores perspective is often evident when an elderly or otherwise physically handicapped customer cannot keep up with the conveyor/checker and thus impedes throughput. Some shoppers place a hand carried basket of items on the conveyor which simply transfers the burden of item removal to the checker.
The desire to eliminate the current inefficiencies led to the invention of the Check Stand Conveyor Vacated Shopping Bin by this inventor (U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/999,861) and this invention, the Check Stand Conveyor Belt Bottom Extracted Shopping Bin. Envisioned is a nested stack of bins available to the customers as they access their shopping carts. The bin is placed crosswise on the top of the cart leaving room for the placement of bulk items into the cart. The customer then places all the desired smaller items into the bin.
At the check stand the customer simply slides the bin onto the check stand conveyor belt. Thus the customer does not have to lift the weight of the bin and its contents.
In the preferred embodiment of this invention the bottom of the bin is slidable to a position substantially outside of the bin and has an angle bracket underneath at the rear which lips over the back of the conveyor table and thus holds the bottom in place as the rest of the bin moves forward with the conveyor. An upward rotating door at the front of the bin has a spring loaded hinge(s) and is held closed by the presence of the bin bottom. Thus when the bottom is extracted the door pops open as the contained items are deposited on the conveyor and moved by the conveyor to the checker. When the bin is empty the checker can simply lift and tilt the bin which returns the bottom and re-locks the door allowing the bin to be placed in a nesting stack.
Several inventions have taught how to make check stand operation more efficient. These include U.S. Pat. No. 3,036,722 (Sharaway), U.S. Pat. No. 3,306,398 (LaChance), U.S. Pat. No. 3,924,709 (Swanson), U.S. Pat. No. 3,446,315 (Close), and U.S. Pat. No. 4,373,611 (Frederick), all of which incorporate a separate conveyor inside a cart and none of which simply use the existing check stand conveyor to empty a bin. U.S. Pat. No. 4,043,426 (Verkler) teaches a cart with a basket that is slidable to the checker. It also does not use the check stand conveyor belt for evacuation and still requires individual items to be manually extracted from the basket. As a matter of fact the Verkler patent is intended for a check stand which does not even have a conveyor, a rarity in today's technology. The Verkler patent also requires a specialized cart. A distinct advantage of the bin of this invention besides not requiring a special conveyor is that contrary to the Verkler patent it does not require a specialized cart. The Swanson patent (U.S. Pat. No. 3,924,709) requires a complicated and expensive bin with a built-in conveyor and does not use the check stand conveyor belt but rather dictates that a special roller drive system be added to the check stand, a requirement that the current chains of supermarkets would highly object to. The Swanson invention also is intended for the currently rare check stand that doesn't even have a conveyor. Musser (U.S. Pat. No. 3,792,757) discloses a highly modified cart that slides over a likewise highly modified conveyor system.
All cited approaches require an expensive cart and extensive modifications to the check stand. The customer is required to position the cart correctly for unloading. Either all bulk items must go through the same unloading and scanning procedure, cumbersome at best, or a separate special procedure would be needed. The slidable basket version is further restricted by a trade-off between capacity and distance the checker must reach for items.
The only invention to the knowledge of this inventor which utilizes the existing check stand conveyor for unloading items from a shopping bin is the Check Stand Conveyor Vacated Shopping Bin (application Ser. No. 14/999,861) by this inventor (McLees), That invention uses the conveyor to advance the bin until a tab on the front door of the bin breaks the photo beam (normally used to stop the conveyor when an item arrives at the checker) near the end of the conveyor nearest the scanner and thereby stops the conveyor and the bin. When the checker opens the front door of the bin the photo beam is revealed thus re-activating the conveyor as the bin is held in place by a simple bin stop added to the check table. An evacuating plunger attached through slots in the bottom of the bin to rails underneath the bin which rest on the moving conveyor pushes the items inside of the bin to the front of the bin until they break the photo beam thus stopping the conveyor until removal and scanning by the checker.
While this approach is quite effective it does have a few drawbacks relative to the new improved bin which is the subject of this disclosure. The original McLees bin structure is fairly complex and could be relatively expensive to manufacture. The checker is required to manually open the bin door while with the bottom extracted bin the door opening is entirely automatic and the checker is required to do nothing during the scanning process beyond what is required if the bin were not there. Also in the original McLees bin the checker may be required to reach over the side of the bin to access some items while the arm/hand movement of simply grasping the item and moving it over the scanner as is the case with the bottom extracted bin is more efficient. Also the check stand requires the slight modification of the addition of the bin hold while the bottom extracted bin requires no additional modification of any kind to the shopping carts or the check stands, an appealing aspect from the standpoint of store managers. The evacuating plunger of the original McLees bin pushing possibly heavy items against possibly fragile items behind more heavy items is certainly less desirable than the bottom extracted bin which simply deposits the items on the conveyor as the conveyor carries away any fragile item from any heavy item behind it that would still be on the bin bottom as the bottom is being extracted.
In
The preferred embodiment is illustrated in
While this is the preferred embodiment it should be herein noted that the bin need not even have a door. After the bottom has been extracted the customer or the checker can simply lift the bin shell and the still attached bottom up off the conveyor, thus depositing the bin contents on the conveyor. The problem with this approach is that the items are not deposited in an orderly fashion and it is possible for some items to hang up in the bin and then drop a considerable distance which would be a bad scenario for things like eggs. However such a bin could be acceptable in some retail outlet for non-food or non-breakable items.
Also in this preferred embodiment there are other ways to keep the sides together at the front thus locking the door closed besides bottom slats in continuous slots the length of the bin. However if the slats were not there the items in a heavily loaded bin could force the bin sides to expand out allowing the bin bottom to slip down between the rails onto the conveyor. If the rails were wider to prevent this the likelihood of items hanging up on the rails is greatly increased, so the logical solution is the preferred embodiment illustrated in
It should also be noted that while the preferred embodiment releases the door automatically the door could be released manually. There could be applications wherein it would be advantages for the door to keep the contents contained until manual release by the checker.
Number | Name | Date | Kind |
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2286548 | Jackson | Jun 1942 | A |
2653723 | Bergman | Sep 1953 | A |
3036722 | Sharaway | May 1962 | A |
3083791 | Shoffner | Apr 1963 | A |
3140758 | Ragnar | Jul 1964 | A |
3196984 | Stout | Jul 1965 | A |
3298568 | Le Brocq | Jan 1967 | A |
3454139 | Lachance | Jul 1969 | A |
3792757 | Musser | Feb 1974 | A |
4007809 | Goransson | Feb 1977 | A |
4353564 | Joseloff | Oct 1982 | A |
4373611 | Frederick | Feb 1983 | A |
5385358 | Adamson | Jan 1995 | A |
5388667 | Sonnendorfer | Feb 1995 | A |
8540273 | Dobrachinski | Sep 2013 | B2 |
20050012286 | Woodrow | Jan 2005 | A1 |
Number | Date | Country | |
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20200085213 A1 | Mar 2020 | US |