US2379934A - Package - Google Patents

Description

y 9 o. E. SEIIFERTH 2,379,934

PACKAGE Filed Oct. 8. 1941 Patented July 10, 1945 PACKAGE oscar E. Seiferth, Chicago, 111., assig'nor to Oscar Mayer & 00., Inc., Chicago, 111., a corporation of Illinois Application October 8 1941, Serial No. 414,088

3 Claims. (01. 99-174) This invention relates to a package, and primarily to a food package. In the form illustrated herewith it is primarily applied to a package of sausages, although it may be applied to many other sorts of articles. One object is to provide a package of any length desired by means of which a number of articles are detachably secured together. Another object is to provide such a package so arranged that advertising or label matter is secured not only to the package as a whole but to individual articles when'theyare separated from each other. A further object is to provide a packagein which a ring or band is fastened about each article and remains so fastened when the individual articles are separated. In the particular form shown, where sausages are secured together, each has a band about it which carries a trade- -mark, a label, or advertising matter, and even when the individual sausages are separated, a band remains about each one. It is an object of the invention to produce such a structure and such a package. Other objects will appear from time to time throughout the specification and claims. e

The invention is illustrated more or less diagrammatically in the accompanying drawing, wherein:

Figure 1 is a top plan view of a package with parts broken away.

Figure 2 is a bottom plan view. I

Figure 3 is a longitudinal section take through the package of Figure 1 at line 3-3.

Like parts are designated by like characters throughout the specification and drawing.

In the particular form shown, a number of sausages I are banded together. The package comprises a lower member 2, which has upon it an adhesive 3. This adhesive is preferably heat responsive, so that when heated it will adhere. As shown, the adhesive extends over the entire surface of the member 2, but the invention is not limited to this feature, and the adhesive might be applied in limited areas so that a necessary band can be formed only wherever required.

An upper member 4 is associated with the lower member 2 and has adhesive S'applied to it. This adhesive may be like the adhesive 3 and may be similar in extent to it, extending over the entire surface of the member 4 or being applied only in limited areas where necessary.

In the completed article, the upper and lower bands 2 and 4 are sealed or bonded together between the articles at areas or portions 8 and thus a partof the band 4 is wrapped around each sausage or other article, and is thus formed into a loop shape part I.

Intermediate the edges of the bonded portions 6 are rows of perforations 8. Preferably at the edges of the strips these perforations are enlarged, as at 9--9, so that they extend across the edge of the combined strip formed of the members 2 and l, and thus tearing'is easily started at the proper point. The tear begins at the enlarged perforation 9 and extends through the smaller perforations 8.

As shown, only six articles are in the package, but an almost unlimited number might be associated together in a single package. The number shown, however, is sufficient to illustrate the nature of the package and the arrangement of the parts which make it up.

When the sausages or other articles which are fastened together in the package are separated, each individual article retains a band, the tear taking place at the perforations B, 9, and each article retaining about itself one loop portion 1 and the adjacent and associated portion of the strip 2, which with the cooperating portion 1 makes up a complete band around the article,

so that even when the individual articles are separated from the package, they still retain the identifying band itself, and'whatever marking maybe printed upon it. This package may be made by hand or by special tools, or by :a machine designed for the purpose, but the package as shown and claimed herewith is not limited to any particular method or means for producing it, nor is it limited to any particular article or particularmeans for securing it together. While adhesive has been shown, it may be of any desired material, and in fact, the adhesive maybe omitted and the two strips may be fastened together by the shape of the perforations themselves. It is well known that two strips of material may be fastened together by mating perforations, by which method a part of one strip is forced or shaped with the other strip or into or through it, so that they are. bound together,

and this type of perforation might be used with out an adhesive.

The invention is therefore not' limited to any particular means or method of fastening the two strips together, nor is it limited to an arrangement in which each article is enclosed by itself.

A package might be made up with two or more articles in a single loop.

Although I have shown an operative form of my invention, it will be recognized that many changes in the form, shape, and arrangement of adhesive is used, there may be one single strip of adhesive between each article, but for some'purposes it is desirable to have two separated strips of adhesive between each article, and in that case the perforations will usually lie between those two separated strips. r

It will be understood from the foregoing that the new packaging structure, in addition to holding the sausages compactly together side by side in a straight row, bands them individually with more or less snugly encircling loop portions, which 'loop portions are formed from the unbonded sec tions of the top and bottom strips and remain intact on the sausages after the bonded web portions 6 connecting such loop portions have been severed.

Although the sausages are held by the intervening web portions in close proximity to each other (preferably in sidewise abutment along the. median plane of the package as'shown in Fig. 3 of the drawing) when the package is laid flat, the.

web portions 6 themselves are of considerable length and are located, not between the loop portions at their points of closest approach, but rather in substantially the plane of the bottom of the package.

The web portions 6, by reason of the substantiallv complete close encirelement of the sausages by the loop portions, are of sumcient length not only to provide ample room for the perforations without danger of such perforations being so close to the joints in the loop portions as to weaken the latter, but also to afford appreciable stock which may be grasped at both sides of the perforations in tearing throu h the latter. The package can obviously be picked up and curled downwardly into a compact roll for wrapping, and any one of the sausages when the package is raised from its flat position can be rather widely separated from the adjoining sausage in order to expose the normally concealed connecting web and give ready access to the web for grasping the latter at opposite sides of the perforations in tearing the sausages apart. When the sausages are torn apart in this manner, the loop portions will, of course,

remain thereon as identifying bands.

The perforations themselves might be of many types. For some purposes the perforations might be completely omitted, and the paper notched at its edges to initiate tearing, or even this may be spoken of a single or a double row or strip of addouble line of adhesive without perforations, or a double line of adhesive with perforations. Where I have used the flord adhesive, any fastening 1 means is to be understood as within the meaning 0f the language and within the scope of my invention.

-In general, the bands} and 4 inay be of the same width and both relatively flexible.

may, howe irer, be of different widths, one broader The;

2,370,934. I thanthe other, and they may be relatively inflexible. One obvious embodiment of the invention is that in. which the lower member! is a card or card-board piece and is ,stifier and of greater width than the band 4. Where in-the claims, the holding means are referred to as "bands," that language is to be taken as including holding members of varying degrees of flexibility and rigidity, and of different widths. In this sense, therefore, if the lower member were a card and the upper member a band, the expression bands" is to'be considered as describing both that arrangement and bands.

' Iclaim:

1. A composite package and individual banding means for link-type sausages, which includes a generally flat flexiblestrip, a plurality of sau-s sages arranged side by side, approximately in an arrangement of two flexible sidewise abutment with each other on said-strip, and generally perpendicular to the length of the strip, the length of the sausages substantially exceeding the width of the strip, the strip, when the package is. completed, being generally tangential to the "sausages, a second strip including portions surrounding and engaging the exterior of each said sausage throughout a substantial part of the'circumference of the sausage, thesausage engaging portions of the second strip forming sharp folds underlying the sausages, the opposite folds along each sausa e being spaced sufllciently apart to permit contact of thefirst strip and the sausage, the part of the seeondstrip between the folds along adjacent sausages being opposed to and secured to thelower strip. the two strips being weakened 'alon'gia line of separation intermediate each pair-of adjacent sausages, the secured portions of the twostrips forming a band about the middle of, each sausage when the sausages are separated.

' 2. As a new articleof manufacture, a packaging structure by means of-which a plurality of link-type sausages'are banded and connected together side-by' side in a substantially. straight row; said, packaging structure being constructed from two strips of sheet material and consisting of a series ofloop portions formed from spaced sections of both strips anda series of intervening web portionsfformed from contacting sections of both strips, which contacting'sections are secured to'each other; the loop portions closely encircling the sausages'and being disposed, when the pack! aging structure is placed in a flat position, with the sides of adjoining loop portions approximately in abutment with each other and with the bottoms .of adjoiningloop portions spaced apart from each other; the intervening web portions being located a substantial distance below the approximately abutting sides of the loop portions at a point adjacent the lower face of the packaging structure when the latter is placed in a flat position, and

being connected to the spaced apart bottoms of the loop portions; said web portions being of substantial length and being weakened along a transverse line intermediate their ends whereby to tear crosswise when forcibly pulled apart without dis-' rupting the loop portions encircling the sausages.

3. As a new article of manufacture, a packaging structure by means of which a plurality of substantially circular link-type sausages are ,in-

dividually banded and connected together sidehv-side in a substantially straight row: said packaging structure being constructed from upper and lower strips of thin flexible sheet material and consisting of a series of substantially circular loop portions formed from spaced sections of both strips and a series of normally fiat but readily flexible intervening web portions formed from contacting sections of both strips, which contacting sections are adhesively bonded to each other throughout substantially the entire areas of the web portions; the loop portions closely en-' spaced apart from each other; the intervening web portions being located a substantial distance below the approximately abutting sides of the loop portions at a point adjacent the lower face: of the packaging structure when the latter is placed in a fiat position, and being joined beneath the loop portions to the spaced apart bottoms of the latter; said web portions being of substantial length and being perforated along a transverse line interthe loop portions encircling the sausages.

OSCAR E. SEIFERTH.

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