Patent Application
20240300701
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The disclosure relates to closure assemblies and more particularly pertains to a new closure assembly for attaching to an upper end of an open bag style container to facilitate creating an airtight closure for the bag.
The prior art relates to closure assemblies and includes a variety of closure assemblies closing off an access into an interior space of an open container. Known prior art does not include a method for effectively sealing bag type containers of various sizes.
An embodiment of the disclosure meets the needs presented above by generally comprising a sleeve including a front wall, a back wall, and a pair of lateral edges joining the front and back walls. The front and back walls abut each other. The sleeve has a top edge and a bottom edge, and each are open. A fastener is mounted on the sleeve adjacent to the bottom edge and is configured to engage an exterior surface of a bag style container such that an open upper end of the bag style container is positioned within the sleeve. A seal is attached to the sleeve adjacent to the top edge and is configured to close the top edge in an air-tight condition.
Another embodiment of the disclosure comprises a method including the steps of extending an open upper end of a bag style container through a bottom edge of a sleeve such that the open upper end is positioned within the sleeve. The sleeve fastens to an exterior surface of the bag style container to form a seal around the bag style container with the sleeve. A top edge of the sleeve closes to prevent air from entering the bag style container.
There has thus been outlined, rather broadly, the more important features of the disclosure in order that the detailed description thereof that follows may be better understood, and in order that the present contribution to the art may be better appreciated. There are additional features of the disclosure that will be described hereinafter and which will form the subject matter of the claims appended hereto.
The objects of the disclosure, along with the various features of novelty which characterize the disclosure, are pointed out with particularity in the claims annexed to and forming a part of this disclosure.
The disclosure will be better understood and objects other than those set forth above will become apparent when consideration is given to the following detailed description thereof. Such description makes reference to the annexed drawings wherein:
With reference now to the drawings, and in particular to
As best illustrated in
A fastener 28 is mounted on the sleeve 12 adjacent to the bottom edge 22 and is configured to engage an exterior surface 32 of a bag style container 30 such that an open upper end 34 of the bag style container 30 is positioned within the sleeve 12. Alternatively, the fastener 28 may be configured to engage with an outside surface 37 of a box style container 35 such as a cereal box. The fastener 28 comprises a first adhesive strip 36 attached to the inner surface 24 of the front wall 14 adjacent to the bottom edge 22 and a second adhesive strip 38 attached to the inner surface 24 of the back wall 16 adjacent to the bottom edge 22. The first 36 and second 38 adhesive strips may comprise a pressure sensitive adhesive and the first 36 and second 38 adhesive strips extend entirely along the bottom edge 22 and to each of the lateral edges 18.
Each of the first 36 and second 38 adhesive strips has one of a pair of removable panels 40 positioned thereon. The removable panels 40 have an anti-adhesive coating positioned thereon to facilitate removal of the removable panels 40 from the first 36 and second 38 adhesive strips. Each of the removable panels 40 may include one of a pair of tabs 42. Each of the tabs 42 is attached to and extends from a boundary edge of one of the pair of removable panels. Each of the tabs 42 provides a grip for a user to grasp when peeling away one of the pair of removable panels 40 from one of the first 36 or second 38 adhesive strips.
A seal 44 is attached to the sleeve 12 adjacent to the top edge 20 and is configured to close the top edge 20 in an air-tight condition. The seal 44 extends from a first lateral edge 46 of the pair of lateral edges 18 to a second lateral edge 48 of the pair of lateral edges 18. The seal 44 normally includes a first mating member 50 attached to the inner surface 24 of the front wall 14 and a second mating member 52 attached to the inner surface 24 of the back wall 16. The first mating member 50 may comprise an elongated ridge and the second mating member 52 may comprise an elongated trough for receiving and frictionally engaging the elongated ridge. The top edge 20 may have a pair of flanges 54 such that each of the flanges 54 is attached to and extending upwardly from one of the front and back walls. The user may grab and pull each of the flanges 54 away from each other to disengage the first mating member 50 from the second mating member 52 such that the top edge 20 is opened.
Alternatively, the first 50 and second 52 mating members may comprise a plurality of interlocking teeth being frictionally engageable with each other and a zipper may be slidably coupled along the top edge 20 of the sleeve 12, wherein the zipper may slide from the first lateral edge 46 to the second lateral edge 48 to frictionally engage the interlocking teeth of the first 50 and second 52 mating members together and the zipper may slide from the second lateral edge 48 to the first lateral edge 46 to disengage the interlocking teeth of the first 50 and second 52 mating members from each other.
In use, the open upper end 34 of the bag style container 30 extends through the bottom edge 22 of the sleeve 12 such that the open upper end 34 is positioned within the sleeve 12. Each of the removeable panels 40 are removed from the first 36 and second 38 adhesive strips such that the first adhesive strip 36 of the front wall 14 and the second adhesive strip 38 of the back wall 16 are securable to the bag style container 30. The sleeve 12 fastens to the exterior surface 32 of the bag style container 30 to form a seal 44 around the bag style container 30 with the sleeve 12. The top edge 20 of the sleeve 12 closes to prevent air from entering the bag style container 30.
With respect to the above description then, it is to be realized that the optimum dimensional relationships for the parts of an embodiment enabled by the disclosure, to include variations in size, materials, shape, form, function and manner of operation, assembly and use, are deemed readily apparent and obvious to one skilled in the art, and all equivalent relationships to those illustrated in the drawings and described in the specification are intended to be encompassed by an embodiment of the disclosure.
Therefore, the foregoing is considered as illustrative only of the principles of the disclosure. Further, since numerous modifications and changes will readily occur to those skilled in the art, it is not desired to limit the disclosure to the exact construction and operation shown and described, and accordingly, all suitable modifications and equivalents may be resorted to, falling within the scope of the disclosure. In this patent document, the word “comprising” is used in its non-limiting sense to mean that items following the word are included, but items not specifically mentioned are not excluded. A reference to an element by the indefinite article “a” does not exclude the possibility that more than one of the element is present, unless the context clearly requires that there be only one of the elements.
