POUCHES AND TOTES AND SYSTEMS COMPRISING POUCHES AND TOTES HAVING ADJUSTABLE DIVIDERS
Provided are systems comprising a tote and one or more pouch fabricated out of a flexible or semi-flexible relatively thermal insulating material, optimally configured for holding, protecting, and carrying a standard reclosable or “zip lock” plastic storage bag. Totes described herein comprise one or more adjustable dividers that reversibly and adjustably fit within the interior compartment of the tote to create subcompartments that support each of the one or more pouches in registered alignment. In combination, the pouches and tote form a system for holding, protecting, and carrying conventional reclosable plastic storage bags.
This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/968,011, filed Aug. 24, 2007, herein incorporated by reference in its entirety.
BACKGROUND OF THE DISCLOSURE1. Technical Field of the Disclosure
The present disclosure relates, generally, to systems comprising a tote and one or more pouches fabricated from a thermally insulating fabric, such as neoprene, wherein each pouch is dimensioned for holding, storing, protecting, and/or transporting a conventional reclosable storage bag.
2. Description of the Related Art
In 1960, the fold-over sandwich bag was created. In 1964, The Glad Products Company (Oakland, Calif.) created a new, more efficient system for closing a plastic storage bag using a so-called “zip lock” method. Inventors continue to refine and add to the art surrounding reclosable plastic storage bags. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,029,178, issued on Apr. 19, 2006, claims a reclosable storage bag with a new locking mechanism. In contrast, the art concerning containers, pouches, and bags for holding, protecting, and carrying such locking reclosable plastic storage bags has tagged far behind.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,797,567, issued Aug. 25, 1998, discloses an “Easy Fill Holder” for reclosable plastic storage bags. The patent discloses a simple frame and support system for holding a plastic storage bag upright, so it can be filled with food or other contents. The art fails, however, to disclose pouches, totes, or other containers specifically designed to hold, protect, carry, and transport plastic storage bags.
Totes are well known in other fields of art. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,620,579 is directed to an “accessories organizer” for an equipment bag with a one-piece foam or other cushioning insert. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 4,610,286 discloses a camera case or bag with adjustable supports to hold cameras and other photographic equipment. Other cases, boxes, and carrying apparatuses exist. See, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,561,576, 4,201,186, 4,081,061, 2,960,137. Bags and carrying cases with multiple compartments are also found in arts as disparate as lunchboxes and CD or DVD carriers and cases. None of these existing carriers and cases is constructed to specifically hold, protect, and transport conventional reclosable plastic storage bags.
Despite the locking mechanisms found on most contemporary “zip lock” type storage bags, such bags can and do leak if turned upside down, locked imperfectly, or carried in a standard bag or backpack with other articles. Other objects and articles, such as books or pens, can puncture plastic storage bags, spilling and spoiling their contents and perhaps damaging or ruining other articles. If reclosable plastic storage bags are stored, packaged, or carried with other objects, those objects can put pressure on the reclosable plastic storage bags, causing the contents to, again, escape past the locking seal and spill out. And, conventional reclosable storage bags lack substantial thermal insulation thereby offering little protection against changes in environmental temperature.
Thus, there remains a need in the art for pouches, totes, and systems specifically designed to hold, protect, and carry standard reclosable plastic storage bags.
SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSUREThe present disclosure fulfills these and other related needs by providing pouches, totes, and systems for holding, protecting, and carrying standard reclosable plastic storage bags and resealable storage containers in a safe, secure, and efficient fashion. Pouches and totes described herein are typically fabricated from a thermally insulating material such as, for example, neoprene, and are dimensioned for securely holding one or more conventional reclosable plastic storage bags.
Thus, the present disclosure provides totes for securely and conveniently holding, protecting, and carrying conventional reclosable plastic storage bags, resealable storage containers, and the like, which themselves can be securely held by the pouches described in this disclosure. As discussed in greater detail herein, totes are sized to optimally carry and accommodate one or more rows of standard sized conventional reclosable plastic storage bags.
Within other embodiments, the present disclosure provides systems for holding, protecting, and carrying conventional reclosable plastic storage bags and other resealable storage containers such as resealable food storage containers. These systems comprise, in combination, the pouches and totes described herein in further combination with one or more dividers that reversibly and adjustably attach to the side-walls of the tote for forming two or more subcompartments.
These and other embodiments, features, and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the detailed description and appended claims set forth herein below.
The accompanying drawings illustrate certain embodiments of the present disclosure. The embodiments described and claimed herein are not, however, limited to these figures, which are merely illustrative. The figures are intended to aid in understanding this disclosure and claims and should be considered in conjunction with other parts of this disclosure. It will be understood that other embodiments fall within the scope of the present disclosure.
As indicated above, the present disclosure provides pouches, totes, and systems for holding, protecting, and carrying conventional reclosable plastic storage bags.
The tote 100 of
It will be understood that a wide variety of structures may be suitably employed for securely closing the tote. For example, instead of a zipper, the cover could reversibly close the tote enclosure using a variety of structures including opposing ridges and grooves, latches, VELCRO® (Velcro USA Inc., Manchester, N.H.), patches or strips, straps and buckles, magnets, adhesives, snap connectors, prongs & holes, elastic bands, and a variety of other closing mechanisms known in the art.
Some of these closing mechanisms would require structural components on both the cover and one or more sidewalls. Indeed, the closing configuration shown in
The present disclosure also provides pouches 112 that can securely hold conventional reclosable plastic storage, “zip lock” bags, or other resealable storage containers such as resealable food storage containers.
As shown in
The pouches described herein are configured and arranged to permit the opening along the top edge 115 to be reversible and sealably closed once a conventional plastic reclosable storage bag has been inserted into the pocket-like enclosure. Again, the disclosed pouches can be closed in a variety of ways known in the art, including VELCRO®G, buttons, snaps, adhesives, safety pins, magnets, ridges and grooves, straps and buckles, latches, and other known fasteners.
Within certain embodiments, pouches according to the present disclosure are configured with one or more connecting structures 118 as depicted in
In one embodiment, the pouches are optimally sized to receive conventional reclosable plastic storage bags of a variety of standard sizes. Currently, reclosable or zip lock plastic storage bags generally come in a number of standard sizes as depicted in Table 1:
For purposes of this application, each standard bag size can be considered to include all plastic storage bags with the corresponding dimensions indicated for that size above, or that is between about 90% and 110% of each of the indicated dimensions.
As noted above, within certain embodiments, the present disclosure provides pouches that are sized to optimally hold, protect, and transport reclosable plastic storage bags of standard sizes. For example,
Within other embodiments, pouches may contain a single grommet as the connecting structure 118 at one or both of the two corners adjacent the pouch opening to permit the connection to another object. As indicated in Table 1, above, pouches containing one or more grommet are typically larger in one or more dimension as compared to pouches containing an external loop as the connecting structure 118. For example,
It will be understood that, depending upon the precise application contemplated, the dimensions of any of the pouches described herein that contain a second grommet will be increased accordingly to accommodate the second grommet while still dimensioned appropriately to receive the corresponding reclosable plastic storage bag or resealable storage container. Typically, pouches containing two grommets will be between about ¾″ to about 1″ longer in one dimension than the corresponding pouch containing one grommet. Because of the larger contents contained within, pouches dimensioned for one gallon reclosable bags or larger, may, optionally, contain two grommets on opposite corners flanking each side of a pouch opening.
The tote depicted in
Typically, the tote 100 is dimensioned to optimally accommodate one or more rows of a standard-sized pouch, having the dimensions described above, so each pouch can be inserted in regimented alignment, along the length or width of the tote and be optimally held and supported in that tote. This sort of optimal, snug carriage is shown in
In one embodiment, each divider 108 employs an attachment device for snuggly and securely interacting with the tote and supporting each pouch in registered alignment. For example,
Claims
1. A tote for holding one or more pouches dimensioned to accommodate a conventional reclosable plastic storage bag, said tote comprising:
- a generally rectangular base attached to four generally rectangular surrounding sidewalls that extend vertically from the base, wherein said base and sidewalls form a compartment with a top opening;
- a cover to said compartment permanently attached to one of the surrounding sidewalls and configured to reversibly attach to the other three sidewalls; and
- one or more adjustable dividers configured to fit within said compartment and to reversibly and adjustably attach to one or more sidewalls, wherein said adjustable dividers permit the division of the compartment into two or more smaller subcompartments, each subcompartment having dimension to permit the secure accommodation of one or more pouches in registered alignment between each one or more adjustable dividers and wherein each of said one or more pouches is dimensioned to accommodate a conventional plastic reclosable storage bag.
2. The tote of claim 1 wherein each adjustable divider further comprises at least one anchoring tab that extends substantially perpendicularly from said divider and configured to allow reversible and adjustable attachment to the inside of the sidewalls of said tote.
3. The tote of claim 1 wherein each of said adjustable dividers comprises one or more attachment members for reversibly and adjustably attaching said adjustable divider to one or more of sidewalls of the tote, said attachment members being selected from the group consisting of VELCRO®, buttons, straps, snap-on elements, adhesives, zippers, tabs fitting into channels, screws, nuts and bolts, or deformable rubber connectors.
4. The tote of claim 1 said tote being sized to specifically accommodate a row of one or more pouches of thermal insulating material, each pouch being dimensioned to accommodate a standard sized conventional plastic reclosable storage bag selected from the group consisting of a snack bag, a sandwich bag, a quart bag, a gallon bag, an extra-large bag, and an extra-extra-large bag.
5. A flexible or semi-flexible pouch for holding a conventional plastic reclosable storage, said pouch comprising:
- two or more sides made from a thermal insulating material;
- said two or more sides being permanently joined at the interface of at least two shared edges to form a pocket-like enclosure having a single opening at one end;
- wherein said pouch is dimensioned to accommodate a standard sized conventional plastic reclosable storage bag selected from the group consisting of a snack bag, a sandwich bag, a quart bag, a gallon bag, an extra-large bag, and an extra-extra-large bag.
6. The flexible or semi-flexible pouch of claim 5 wherein at least two of said two or more sides of the pouch are formed by folding over a single piece of relatively thermal insulating material, creating two sides with a common edge.
7. The flexible or semi-flexible pouch of claim 5 wherein at least two of the said two or more sides of the pouch are formed from two separate pieces of said relatively thermal insulating material.
8. The flexible or semi-flexible pouch of claim 5 wherein said pouch is formed by permanently joining the two or more sides by sewing or stitching them together along two edges.
9. The flexible or semi-flexible pouch of claim 5 wherein the relatively thermal insulating material is neoprene.
10. A system for securely holding, storing, and transporting one or more conventional plastic reclosable storage bags comprising:
- a tote comprising a generally rectangular base attached to four generally rectangular surrounding sidewalls that extend vertically from the base, wherein said base and sidewalls form a compartment with a top opening;
- a cover to said enclosure permanently attached to one of the surrounding sidewalls and configured to reversibly attach to the other three sidewalls;
- one or more adjustable dividers configured to fit within said enclosure and to reversibly and adjustably attach to one or more sidewalls, wherein said adjustable dividers permit the division of said compartment into two or more smaller subcompartments each of which subcompartment is dimensioned to securely accommodate one or more pouches in registered alignment between each one or more adjustable dividers;
- one or more flexible or semi-flexible pouches comprising two or more sides made from a relatively thermal insulating material, each side defining four edges, said two or more sides being permanently joined at the interface of at least two shared edges to form a pocket-like enclosure with a single opening at one end of said enclosure and wherein each of said one or more pouches is dimensioned to accommodate a conventional plastic reclosable storage bag.
11. The system of claim 10 wherein at least two of said two or more sides of the pouch are formed by folding over a single piece of relatively thermal insulating material, creating two sides with a common edge; wherein said two or more sides of each flexible or semi-flexible pouch are made from neoprene; and wherein each pouch is dimensioned to accommodate one conventional size plastic reclosable storage bags selected from the group consisting of a snack bag, a sandwich bag, a quart bag, a gallon bag, an extra-large bag, or an extra-extra-large bag.
Type: Application
Filed: Aug 22, 2008
Publication Date: Feb 26, 2009
Inventor: Andrea Sampson (Poulsbo, WA)
Application Number: 12/197,181
International Classification: B65D 30/22 (20060101); B65D 33/16 (20060101); B65D 81/38 (20060101); B65D 30/00 (20060101);