Patent Grant
11565930
This invention relates to beverage system including a beverage appliance apparatus and a beverage container where the functions and user interface required for creating beverages may be activated and controlled through a pre-programmed App (an algorithm created specifically for the beverage system), residing external to, and wirelessly communicating with the apparatus.
The recent COVID-19 pandemic created a new reality in many established parts of the economy. Nowhere has the impact been greater than in the restaurant and bar segment. As a result of this more people were looking to substitute their visit to the bar with preparing mixed drinks at home. At present there are several appliances available to the consumer in the US, and there are most likely many more of these type appliances available in other countries. Many of the beverage appliances in the US market at the present are capsule-based and some use pre-mixed concentrates or other manners to provide the alcohol and mixes.
The appliances presently available to the consumer in the US carry a price tag that ranges from $200 and up. For the most part, these appliances are relatively large and occupy large amount of countertop space, be it in the kitchen, the wet bar, or a man-cave. Amongst the more popular and heavily advertised product is the Drinkworks® Home Bar by Keurig® being offered for sale at a price range of $250 to $299. To create a mixed beverage the user would have to place a beverage container into the appliance, retailing at an average price of $4.00.
While it is understood that there are other types of automatic beverage appliances available in the US market it was determined to use The Drinkworks® Home Bar appliance and beverage containers as the representative prior art, as it is known to be the dominant system in the US market, and the system offers many user benefits which drive the demand for the appliance, some of these user-benefits include:
a. Speed—The machine takes about 1 minute to produce a mixed drink.
b. Variety—The user can create a variety of drinks without having to purchase various liquors, mixes, and flavorings.
c. Quality—User feedback indicates a high level of satisfaction with the quality of the drink.
d. Convenience—User can produce any mixed beverage effortlessly.
e. Simplicity—User need not remember beverage recipes or look them up.
f. Space savings—User need not stock alcohol, mixes, and other additions.
g. Pride of ownership—The appliance is impressive and attractive.
h. Recognizable brand—Drinkworks® Home Bar is marketed under the well-known Keurig® brand.
The business model being followed is based on the long-term revenue being generated by the sale of consumables (the beverage containers in the case of the Drinkworks® Home Bar). It should be based on offering the beverage appliance at an attractive price and relying on the profit to be generated from beverage containers sales. Due to the high manufacturing cost of the appliance it is offered to the consumer at a price point of $250, which understandably creates a barrier to broaden the customer base needed to increase the sales of the consumables, namely the beverage containers.
Size and product footprint are other factors that might create a barrier to broaden the customer base of the beverage appliance. The expected potential customer typically lives in an urban environment with limited space that would not support another large appliance, especially where the product might be used daily, and therefore would not be put away after each use.
Lastly, while the beverage appliance offers the user all the benefits listed above, it has some inherent drawbacks such as a long cooldown time, the need to purchase CO2 containers, and the need for routine draining and cleaning.
Therefore, a strong case can be made for an appliance offering all, or most of, the user benefits of the existing Drinkworks® Home Bar at a lower price point. This is especially true if such product had a small footprint, requiring minimum maintenance, and needed no cooldown time. These criteria could be met if the appliance includes just the bare minimum of the components required to extract the content from the beverage container and excludes carbonation and refrigeration. Further savings could be made if the control functions are stored in a mobile app rather than a PCB as is the case with the current product. While saving a great deal of cost, it also stands to reason that a beverage appliance that is controlled through a smart phone app would appeal to a broad segment of the market, particularly tech savvy individuals.
The foregoing examples of the related art and limitations related therewith are intended to be illustrative and not exclusive. The limitations of the related art will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon a reading of the specification and a study of the drawings.
One aspect of the present invention is to provide a low-cost, small footprint, easy to use beverage appliance which communicates with an App that may be downloaded to the user's smart phone or tablet. The beverage appliance is designed to be used in conjunction with beverage containers such as the Drinkworks® beverage containers.
The invention may be embodied in or practiced using a beverage system comprising: a beverage container having a beverage material sealed therein; and a beverage appliance configured to receive the beverage container and produce a beverage from the beverage material, the beverage appliance comprising a precursor supply and a dispensing assembly, the dispensing assembly configured to combine the beverage material with the precursor supply, wherein the beverage container further comprises indicia specific to the content of the beverage material sealed therein, and the beverage system further comprising a specifically programmed downloadable application, whereupon scanning the indicia the pre-programmed application is prompted to interact with the user and may also interact with the beverage appliance to create and dispense into a user container a beverage specific to the indicia of said beverage container.
The foregoing summary, as well as the following detailed description of an exemplary embodiment, will be better understood when read in conjunction with the appended drawings.
The various components enclosed within the housing 102 include for example: a hi pressure pump to move precursor liquid from the reservoir 104 to a carbonation system, where the precursor liquid can be carbonated, via a gas, supplied by a pressurized canister or bottle 101, such as a carbon dioxide canister or bottle, located within the housing 102. The precursor liquid is chilled by a cooling system. The precursor liquid is moved to the dispensing station 108 and dispensed into the user container 107. To generate a desired beverage, the carbonated liquid can be mixed with a beverage material contained in a beverage container 200 shown in
Control of the beverage appliance 100 and its components are performed by control circuitry which is enclosed entirely within the housing 102, which includes a programmed general purpose computer and/or other data processing devices along with suitable software or other operating instructions, one or more memories (including non-transient storage media that can store software and/or other operating instructions), a power supply for the control circuitry and/or other system components, temperature and liquid level sensors, pressure sensors, RFID interrogation devices or other machine readable indicia readers (such as those used to read and recognize alphanumeric text, barcodes, security inks, etc.), input/output interfaces (e.g., such as a user interface to display information to a user and/or receive input from a user), communication buses or other links, a display 103 located on the top front portion of the housing for ease or reading by the user, switches, relays, triacs, motors, mechanical linkages and/or actuators, and/or other components necessary to perform desired input/output or other functions of the beverage machine 100.
The beverage appliance 100 according to the prior art is designed to receive a beverage container 200, an isometric view of the exterior of which is shown in
It has been stated above that a strong case can be made for an appliance offering all, or most of, the user benefits of the existing Drinkworks® Home Bar at a low manufacturing cost achieved by designing a system where the beverage appliance includes just the bare minimum of the components required to extract the content from the beverage container, excluding carbonation and refrigeration, eliminating the on-board user interface and the controls associated with it and the electronics required for controlling the rest of the functions of the appliance. All of which being accomplished through a dedicated downloadable app that may be accessed by the user and may communicate wirelessly with the appliance. In addition to the cost savings achievable, such an appliance would have a small footprint, require minimum maintenance, and no need for any cooldown time. It also stands to reason that a beverage appliance that is controlled through a smart phone app would appeal to a broad segment of the market, particularly tech-savvy individuals.
Four different embodiments of such a beverage system and beverage appliance according to the invention are described below in specific detail.
b and 3C illustrate a first embodiment 300 of beverage appliance according to the invention, it includes a vertical cylindrical housing 302 that supports a dispensing station 308, via a hollow bridge portion 301 serving as a conduit for air and precursor tubes required for the extraction of the beverage material 210 and for providing the precursor liquid for mixing with the beverage material prior to delivery into the user container 307. The housing 302 is fixed to a wide base 306, also serving as a drip tray and for placing a user container 307 to be filled with a beverage. The housing 302 encloses a graduated precursor container 304 that allowing the user to gauge the amount of precursor liquid (being carbonated, still, plain, or flavored) to be filled in correspondence with the beverage material chosen by the user. Also enclosed in the housing 302 is a pump, (not shown) for moving the precursor liquid from the precursor container to the dispensing station 308 and dispensed into the user container 307, and an air pump (not shown) for pressurizing the beverage container 200 for dispensing the beverage material 210, mixing it with the precursor liquid and delivering it by gravity into the user container 307.
More details of the components of the first embodiment are being provided in
More details of the components of the third embodiment are being provided in
More details of the components of the fourth embodiment are being provided in
Prior art beverage appliance is represented in
The beverage appliance 100 according to the prior art must contain a very elaborate control circuit 130 to manage the operation of the appliance including the user interface 103, used to direct and instruct the user what type of user container to use, whether to place ice in the user container, what garnishes to add to the drink, and others.
It would be apparent to a person skilled in the art that the components and the controls required for the operation of the beverage appliance according to the prior are expensive and require a large enclosure to be contained.
The first exemplary embodiment is represented in
The entire user interface is accomplished through the app on the smart phone 700. The app is programmed to initially prompt the user to take a picture of the indices 209 on the beverage cartridge 200. The picture is then processed by the program to identify the beverage cartridge being use and to initiate the relevant user interface used to direct and instruct the user as to the amount and type of precursor liquid to place in the precursor container 304 what type of user container 307 to use, whether to place ice in the user container, what garnishes to add to the drink, and others and to instructs the user when to press the on off button 309 to start and stop the beverage making process.
Due to its compactness, the minimum power required by the beverage appliance according to the first embodiment of the invention it could be designed as a battery-operated apparatus, and thereby usable while camping, tailgating, or at poolside. Alternately, it could be used at home by being plugged into low-voltage power supply, thereby being classified by the electrical approval authorities as a low voltage appliance, being exempt from the costly and time-consuming safety approval testing.
Some of the advantages of the beverage appliance according to the first embodiment over the prior art include: no need for user to wait for the system to cool down, or to drain and clean the unit, as no precursor liquid remains in the unit at the end of the cycle. There is no need to purchase and exchange CO-2 canisters. The only extra step is to fill the precursor cup before each use.
It would be apparent to a person skilled in the art that the few components required for the operation of the beverage appliance according to the first embodiment of the invention are far less expensive and require a smaller enclosure than the prior art.
The second and the third exemplary embodiments are represented in
The entire user interface is accomplished through the app on the smart phone 700, used to direct and instruct the user as to the type of precursor liquid to place in the precursor container 404 what type of user container 307 to use, whether to place ice in the user container, what garnishes to add to the drink, and others.
The control circuit 430 in the second and third embodiment consists of a scanner positioned to read the indices 209 of the beverage container 200, to wirelessly transmit that information to the smart devices, such as the smart phone 700 for controlling a timing circuit which is part of the control circuit 430 to turn the air pump and the precursor pump on and off in accordance with the information provided by indices 209.
Some of the advantages of the beverage appliance according to the second and third embodiments over the prior art include: no need for user to wait for the system to cool down, or to drain and clean the unit, as the only liquids remaining in the unit at the end of the cycle are in the precursor container 404, which would be removed, empties and refilled at the start of a new cycle. There is no need to purchase and exchange CO-2 canisters.
It would be apparent to a person experienced in the art that the few components and minimal controls required for the operation of the beverage appliance according to the second and third embodiments of the invention, while being more elaborate than that in the first embodiment are far less expensive and require a smaller enclosure than the prior art.
The fourth exemplary embodiment is represented in
The objective of having two (or more) precursor containers was to facilitate the beverage appliance to create consecutively beverages that require, for example still precursor and carbonated precursor, by the appliance having one liquid container with still precursor and the other with carbonated precursor.
The entire user interface is accomplished through the app on the smart phone 700, used to interact with the user by prompting answers to the following, for examples: what was the type of precursor liquid that was placed in liquid containers 604′ and 604″? Also prompting to user to provide a specific type of user container 607, whether to place ice in the user container, what garnishes to add to the drink, and others.
The control circuit 630 in the fourth embodiment consists of a scanner positioned to read the indices 209 of the beverage container 200, to transmit that information to the smart devices, such as the smart phone 700 for controlling a timing circuit which is part of the control circuit 630 to turn the air pump and precursor pumps on and off in accordance with the information provided by indices 209.
Some of the advantages of the beverage appliance according to the fourth embodiment over the prior art include: no need for user to wait for the system to cool down, or to drain and clean the unit, as the only liquids remaining in the unit at the end of the cycle are in the precursor containers 604′ and 604″, which would be removed, empties and refilled at the start of a new cycle. There is no need to purchase and exchange CO-2 canisters.
It would be apparent to a person skilled in the art that the few components and minimal controls required for the operation of the beverage appliance according to the fourth embodiments of the invention, while being more elaborate than that in the first embodiment are far less expensive and require a smaller enclosure than the prior art.
The drawings and specifications outlined above demonstrate that it is possible to use the vast amount of logic present in contemporary smart phones in conjunction with a downloadable application as a replacement for most of the controls in a beverage appliance as per the prior art thereby reducing the cost and the size of the appliance it also clearly apparent that use of the mobile app is not only cost effective but can also enhance the user experience, by:
a. Being fun/engaging, especially to tech-savvy individuals
b. Adding a wow factor to the product
c. Enabling the user to customize beverages.
d. Being an effective reference guide to quickly create a beverage with minimal steps.
Smart Phone app can also provide extensive information about the drink, such as amount of alcohol in drink, calories, snack pairings, etc. In addition, use of smart phone for interaction with the beverage appliance may be password protected to prevent use by underage family members. Through IoT and e-commerce connectivity the App can also alert user to order more beverage containers, special offerings, generate orders and pay for purchase, etc.
It should be understood that while the invention has been shown and described with reference to the specific exemplary embodiments shown, various changes in form and detail may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention, and that the invention should therefore only be limited according to the following claims, including all equivalent interpretation to which they are entitled.
| Number | Name | Date | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20160039653 | Jangbarwala | Feb 2016 | A1 |
| 20190291062 | Wood | Sep 2019 | A1 |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 20210380392 A1 | Dec 2021 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 63034860 | Jun 2020 | US |
