The present disclosure relates to packaging for pourable materials, and in particular, to a box with a slide opening and an integral liner for containing and dispensing pourable items such as cereal or other foodstuffs.
A wide range of pourable products such as dry cereals, small cookies or crackers, pet foods, powdered laundry soap and many others are held in and dispensed from cardboard box containers. Often, to preserve the freshness of food products and prevent leakage of fine particle food and other products, these boxes enclose a sealed waxed paper or plastic bag for holding the manufactured product. While effectively containing and preserving the manufactured products, opening such a container is a cumbersome process. A user must open the top of the box and then manipulate and tear open the bag held within. If the sealed top of the bag is not carefully torn open, the bag may rip down the side, spilling product.
Conventional folding cartons are also ill suited for re-closure, especially since users customarily dispense only a portion of the contents at a time. After opening the box and dispensing some of the product, users must attempt to re-close the bag by folding or rolling up the open top. This must be done with the bag in the box (if removed, the bag may deform and no longer fit), and results in a partially closed unsealed bag prone to spilling product between the bag and the box.
The containers themselves are also difficult to close. Typical closures are the cartons flaps glued onto each during manufacture. For commercial cereal boxes, after opening, to close the box users must open a slit in the flap and bend the flap of the box top to insert a tab in the slit. Opening the box top frequently results in tearing and ruining the closure. Also, the slit must be opened along a perforation, which frequently results in tearing it to the edge of a flap also rendering the closure inoperable. Even if the slit is preserved and the tab carefully inserted therein, the closure is prone to unwanted opening.
Standard cereal boxes are typically delivered in a tube-shaped standard folding carton, partially assembled and collapsed condition. When manufacturing boxes in large quantities, e.g. for mass distribution of breakfast cereals, it is preferable to have the box delivered to the filling machine as a folded flat. Automated machinery at the food processor opens up the flat carton, folds and secures top or bottom flaps to form a box with an open end. Next the filling machine fills the box with product, and then glue closes the box to be a ready consumer package.
Applicant has developed packages of new and differing functionality which offer significant improvements in dispensing, closing and reopening yet maintaining the manufacturing and filling process the same as standard folding cartons which work with conventional high speed machinery, over the prior art, and keeping the look of a standard carton for the consumer's familiarity. Applicant is the named inventor on numerous U.S. patents directed to specialty packaging including U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,116,499, 6,273,332, 6,360,942, 6,435,402, 6,945,449, 7,040,528, 7,156,286 and 7,743,973, and application Ser. No. 12/686,252 filed Jan. 12, 2010. These patents and the pending application show the progression of Applicant's innovative packaging designs, and how they have evolved to become friendlier to the high-speed form, fill and seal machines used by major food processing companies in producing hundreds of packages per minute.
While Applicant's display package design and the technology described in existing patents offer many advantages over the prior art, there remains a need for a mass producible box with a sealed bag inside, for storing and maintaining the required liner by cereal manufacturing companies, while providing dispensing portions of the contents and re-closing the box with ease. The need exists for a box for containing pourable items where the liner bag is conveniently constructed along with the box, and the liner bag can be opened and closed as the box is opened and closed by a convenient slide opener. The need also exists for a box capable of maintaining high speed production manufacturing that can actually be manufactured by the food companies because it offers the economical advantage of high volume mass production.
A box having an integral liner for containing pourable items and a method of packaging and dispensing pourable products, such as cereal in a high speed production line that is friendly to existing packaging machinery, is disclosed. A box having an integral liner is thrilled from a foldable box blank. The foldable box blank has a plurality of sides coupled together, each of the sides corresponding to a side of the box when folded. The foldable box blank is preferably made of single sheet cardboard or similar material, which may be stamped to create fold lines and perforations.
A first side of the box blank has a dispensing and closing mechanism technology serving as the opening through which pourable product will be dispensed. Coupled to the first side opening, a slide allows the box to be opened and closed when the package is used. The slide may be coupled to the first side prior to assembly, allowing the package to be constructed specifically from a single flat piece of box blank stock for high speed line assembly. Additionally, the box opening can be placed virtually anywhere on the box convenient for pouring. This box design, while incorporating a dispensing mechanism, is made the same way as conventional boxes already on the market with the same advantages of mass production. It offers a convenient side pouring feature and recloses without tearing the box or the bag in it, thereby avoiding the problems of reclosing an opened and/or damaged bag, and the likelihood of destroying the tab and slot closure on a conventional box top.
As moisture and dust proof along with freshness is a desired and necessary characteristic of the goods contemplated to be held in and dispensed from the box, a bag substantially sealed inside the box forms part of the package. The bag may be made from a moisture impervious material, including a heat-sealable plastic-type material known to skilled persons for maintaining the freshness and dryness of contained items, or materials known and used in conventional cardboard box sealed bags which satisfies these purposes.
Typically the moisture impervious material substantially covers the box blank prior to package assembly. Opposing sides of the moisture impervious material may be brought together beyond the edge of the box blank to form two layers that are sealed. By also sealing the bottom or top edge of the moisture impervious material, and folding the blank into a box shape, a bag with an opening adjacent the open top or bottom of the box is automatically formed.
The moisture impervious material preferably has a perforated portion, defining an opening, overlaying and aligned with the side opening of the box. The opening of the moisture impervious material liner and the side opening of the box are preferably sealed together to prevent product from lodging between the bag and the box after initial opening. The moisture impervious material may also extend past the slide, and substantially past an edge of the box blank corresponding to the bottom or top of a completed box. By sealing the openings of the box and bag, once the moisture impervious material is completely sealed to hold product, a substantially air-tight re-sealable package is produced.
As discussed, once the fold or manufacturing joint is sealed, the blank is ready to be formed the same way as a conventional box by first sealing the bottom or the top portion of the liner and then the bottom or top portion of the blank, ready to be filled and to be sealed to form a complete package. Once product is introduced into the package, it may be closed and sealed until opened by a user. Glue or a similar adhesive may also be used to attach selected portions of the bag, notably around the opening, to the box blank. Using the integral liner also eliminates the empty corners found in conventional cereal boxes with bags, and thus makes it possible for manufacturers to use smaller boxes saving on paper and the environment.
Completing the method, to use the package, a user lifts open the slide opening to expose the opening in the bag inside the box. In one embodiment, it is anticipated the slide will have a first portion adapted to slide along the first side of the box, and a second portion adapted to extend away from the box top. It is also anticipated that the slide may comprise a tab allowing a user to actuate the slide more easily. In an alternative embodiment, a removable patch (not shown) may also be sealed over the perforated portion.
Conventional boxes require users to carefully separate the glued together box top flaps often resulting in tearing, and having no ability to reclose the interior sealed bag. In contrast the present invention simply requires that a user lifts up on the lid, thereby opening the slide, with the optional additional step of removing a tab over the slide sealing the interior bag, e.g. pushing in the perforated area, for dispensing products from the inner bag.
Upon first use of the slide, the box opening is exposed along with the section of the bag to be opened. A user may remove the section of the bag, which is typically surrounded by perforations, to access the product. In addition to the perforated opening being located overlaying the box opening, in one embodiment, a tab may be present adjacent the perforated portion of the bag to facilitate removal. Once the portion of the bag surrounded by perforations is removed, with the slide in an open configuration, product may be poured through the side opening.
Once a desired amount of pourable product is dispensed from the box, a user may push close the opener to close the box and cover the inner bag. Without further actions by the user such as folding over the bag or clipping it closed, freshness of the pourable product in the package will be preserved. Due to the position of the opening on the side of the box and tabbed slide, the slide may be engaged with a user's thumb in one embodiment. In order to prevent the portion of the slide covering the opening from dislocating from the box, the slide may be equipped with one or more stops adapted to limit sliding movement of the slide.
In one alternative embodiment, it is anticipated that the sheet of moisture impervious material may be in a folded condition prior to the steps of sealing opposing edges of the moisture impervious material to form a bag and attaching the bag to the box blank. In this embodiment, the folded sheet of moisture impervious material also has an opening defined by perforations adapted to overlay the side opening. It is anticipated that the method of use of the assembled package in this embodiment will be substantially the same as in other embodiments.
In a second alternative embodiment method of packaging and dispensing pourable product a box blank is formed having a plurality of sides coupled together, including a first side having a side opening coupled to a slide covering the side opening. A sheet or liner of moisture impervious material is attached to the box blank, substantially covering it. The liner has an opening overlaying the side opening. An adhesive may be applied to a predetermined portion of the sheet for attaching to another portion of the sheet for forming a sealed tube from which the sealed bag is formed.
The box blank is then formed into a box with the liner forming a bag inside the box. Thereafter the bottom edges of the liner may be sealed forming a sealed bag inside the box. In this manner, a multiplicity of the boxes may be stacked in a collapsed configuration for later use prior to opening the boxes from the collapsed configuration for filling with the pourable product. The bag is then filled with the pourable product, and the top of the bag sealed. Thereafter, a user may open and close the box in the manner according to the first embodiment.
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To continue box assembly, the slide 72 is situated between the slider retention portion 52 and the liner 100 with the slide 72 in communication with the liner flap 102. Further, the overlapping flap 48 is folded along fold line 50 so that it is approximately perpendicular to second major side 24 and then similarly folding between second major side 24 and second minor side 22 along fold line 42, folding between second minor side 22 and first major side 20 along fold line 36 and then folding between first major side 20 and first minor side 18 along fold line 30. The overlapping flap 48 is then glued or otherwise adhered to the first minor side 18 to form a generally rectangular box 12 as shown in
In some embodiments, it may be preferable to prepare the liner 100 and blank 10 for assembly by passing the blank 10 and liner 100 through hot rollers or other sealing apparatus under pressure. Referring to
Adhesive strips 114 incorporated onto the surface of the unassembled blank 10 are designed to hold the liner 100 in position as the blank 10 is folded into a three-dimensional box 12. Although adhesive strips are contemplated, alternative embodiments may employ adhesive in spots, not shown, across predetermined portions of the box blank, or in another configuration to support the bag in position.
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While particular forms of the invention have been illustrated and described, it will also be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications can he made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. Accordingly, it is not intended that the invention be limited except by the full breadth and scope of the appended claims.
This application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/1775,779, filed on Jul. 1, 2011.
Number | Date | Country | |
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Parent | 13175779 | Jul 2011 | US |
Child | 14339408 | US |