BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to infants carriers, and in particular, to infant carriers which can be attached to shopping carts to securely hold the infant in the shopping cart. Even more particularly, the present invention relates to an infant seat for shopping carts which includes a new and improved locking means for securely holding the infant seat to the shopping cart. Infant seats for holding infants securely in shopping carts are becoming more and more important. Numerous accidents have occurred because safety devices have not been attached to shopping carts to prevent injuries due to children falling out of the carts. Shopping carts are normally provided with a built-in foldable child seat upon which the child can sit. However, these foldable mechanisms do nothing to restrain the child in the seat. An improvement to shopping carts was made by the Safe-Strap Company of Old Tappan, New Jersey. This improvement comprised a two piece seat belt which was fastened to the shopping cart. The seat belt includes mating buckle parts at each end of the seat belt for detachably joining together and thereby securing the child in the conventional folding seat in the shopping cart.

Another improvement comprised the provision of a molded infant seat on the shopping cart. Some of these devices attached over the conventional fold out seat, and others attached over the horizontal longitudinally extending top side rails of the shopping cart. Examples

of these include U.S. Patent Nos. 4,958,887, 4,861,105, 3,351,380, 4,834,404 and 4,598,945.

The problem with the existing infant seats for attaching to shopping carts is that they either do not provide adequate means for securing the shopping cart to the infant seat, thereby risking injury if the entire seat falls off the shopping cart, or the seats are not easily removable because they are bolted to the shopping cart, requiring tools to remove it. Additionally, some, although providing releasable means for attaching the seat to the cart, are too easily removed, thereby allowing for theft. This is especially a disadvantage when the infant seats are provided by a store for use by customers, e.g., in a supermarket.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide an infant carrier for shopping carts.

It is still a further object of the present invention to provide an infant carrier for shopping carts which is securely fastenable to the shopping cart, thereby to prevent injuries, but which is also removable from the shopping cart by virtue of its use of a detachable fastening device. It is yet still a further object of the present invention to provide an infant carrier which can be securely fastened to the shopping cart but which can be easily removed by authorized persons, thereby preventing theft. It is yet still another object of the present invention to provide an infant carrier for shopping carts

which can be removed by authorized persons without requiring special tools other than an unlocking key.

It is yet still a further object of the present invention to provide a lockable fastening device for attaching an infant seat to a shopping cart.

The above and other objects of the present invention are achieved by an infant carrier for a shopping cart comprising an infant seat, the infant seat having a seat area for receiving the infant, and further having at least one eyelet along a lower portion thereof, the eyelet being arranged so as to be adjacent a bar of the shopping cart when the infant seat is disposed on the shopping cart, the eyelet being adapted to receive a locking device therethrough, the locking device further being adapted to be disposed around the bar of the shopping cart, thereby to secure the infant seat to the shopping cart.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The present invention will now be described in greater detail in the following detailed description with reference to the drawings, in which:

Fig. 1 is a front schematic plan view of the infant carrier for shopping carts of the present invention; Fig. 2 is a plan view of the locking device and key utilized for fastening the infant carrier to a shopping cart in the present invention;

Fig. 3 shows a conventional shopping cart with the conventional built-in foldable infant seat in the unfolded position;

Fig. 4 shows the infant carrier according to the present invention being placed into position on the

shopping cart over the conventionally disposed built-in foldable shopping cart seat;

Fig. 5 shows a mounting arrangement for the infant carrier according to the present invention on a shopping cart;

Fig. 6 shows an alternative mounting arrangement for the infant carrier according to the present invention;

Fig. 7 shows the locking device according to the present invention in its unlocked position;

Fig. 8 shows a detail of the bottom of the infant carrier according to the present invention showing the infant seat locked to a horizontal cross bar of the shopping cart, and further showing a detail of the locking device in an inset;

Fig. 9 is a perspective view of the infant carrier mounted in one mounting arrangement on the shopping cart; and

Fig. 10 shows a side plan view of the infant carrier according to the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

With reference now to the drawings, Fig. 1 is a front plan schematic view of the infant carrier according to the present invention which can be mounted on a shopping cart. The infant carrier, as shown more clearly in Figs. 4, 5, 6, and 10 generally comprises a molded plastic infant seat 10, and is usually provided with a padded contoured cavity 11 for comfortably supporting a child. Generally, the infant seat includes a suitable restraining strap provided with the seat to restrain the child in the infant seat.

The bottom of the infant seat is provided with a contoured molded surface which generally allows place¬ ment on a flat surface and also is adapted to mount to various forms of shopping carts. In particular, as shown in Figs. 1, 8 and 10, the bottom of the infant seat includes a gently rounded portion 12 forming two forward legs 13, a groove 14 as well as a further rounded groove 16 forming two rear legs 17. Generally, these grooves do not run completely across the bottom of the infant seat, but are provided in two projecting portions 18 which extend downwardly from the bottom of the infant seat. These various grooves are provided so that the infant seat can be supported on various types of shopping carts made by different manufacturers. Additionally, another groove 19 may also be provided.

The infant carrier substantially as described is conventionally available from such manufacturers as Century Products, of Ohio.

According to the present invention, a modification is made to the infant seat. A horizontal cross bar 20 is provided which runs through the two portions 18. The horizontal cross bar 20 is provided near the groove 14, and preferably forward of the groove 14 as shown in the views of Figs. 8 and 10. The bar 20 can be fastened to the molded plastic portions 18 of the infant seat with suitable fasteners, for example, the rod 20 can be threaded and nuts and washers on either side of each portion 18 can be used to secure it. Alternatively, such fasteners can be disposed with entirely. At each outward end of the rod 20, an eyelet 22 is provided, e.g., threaded onto the rod 20. The eyelets may be shown enlarged in Fig. 1 for ease of presentation.

Another part of the invention is the locking device, shown in Fig. 2, which can be used to lock the infant seat to the shopping cart. The locking device comprises a lock generally designated at 24 having two curved jaws 26 extending in a circular arrangement and contacting each other at a point 28. A key 30 is provided for locking the locking device 24 in the locked position shown in Fig. 2 and also providing the lock 24 in the unlocked position shown in Fig. 7. As shown, the two curved jaws 26 move away from each other when in the unlocked position.

The infant carrier according to the present invention is used as follows:

Fig. 3 shows a conventional shopping cart. First, the conventionally available built-in foldable infant seat is folded out into its deployed position as shown in Fig. 3. The front gate 32 of the shopping cart, which is hinged at its upward end to allow nesting of shopping carts into one another, is preferably secured to the bottom panel of the shopping cart with a plastic tag or tie. The location of the plastic tie is shown generally at 34 in Fig. 3. For example, a plastic cable tie can be used to accomplish this. This is done to prevent attempts at nesting which could damage the infant carrier. Next, the infant carrier, according to the present invention, is placed over the fold-out built-in infant seat so that the infant will face the shopping cart user. The infant seat is provided on the shopping cart such that the fold out seat back cross bar 36 of the shopping cart fits into the grooves 16 at the back end of the bottom of the infant seat. On some brands of infant seats, a spring loaded or snap hook 15 is provided to secure the seat to the bar 36.

Next, the infant seat is allowed to fall into position over the fold out built-in infant seat which is a part of the shopping cart. In Fig. 5, which shows one mounting arrangement, the gently curved area 12 is positioned so that it is over the handle 38 of the shopping cart. In this mounting arrangement, the infant seat lies over the conventional fold out shopping cart infant seat such that the area 12 rests on handle 38 and the groove 14 also comes to receive another bar of the shopping cart which is provided just ahead of the handle 38. This bar is shown more clearly in Fig. 8 and identified with reference numeral 40. It runs across the shopping cart just forward of the handle bar. As shown in Fig. 5 and more clearly in Fig. 8, the infant seat comes to rest such that the bar 40 is received in the grooves 14.

Alternatively, depending on the manufacturer of and type of cart, the infant carrier may be mounted as shown in Fig. 6. In that figure, the gently curved area 12 comes to rest on the bar 40 of the shopping cart. A detail of this mounting arrangement is shown in Fig. 10.

In either mounting arrangement, that of Figs. 6 and 10 or that of Figs. 5 and 8, once the infant seat has been disposed on the shopping cart, the cross bar 40 which is attached to the infant seat will be adjacent or near the cross bar 20 which is a part of the shopping cart. The eyelets 22 accordingly will be adjacent or near the bar 40 of the shopping cart. In order to secure the infant seat to the shopping cart, the lock 24 is set to the open position, as shown in Fig. 7. To lock the infant seat to the shopping cart, the jaws 26 in the open position are placed around the rod of the shopping cart 40 and disposed such that one of the jaws 26 is placed

through the center hole in the eyelet 22. The key 30 is then used to close the jaws 26 so that the bar 40 runs through the center of the lock and the jaws 26 are in the center of the eyelet. The lock 24 cannot then be removed. The lock 24 thus secures the infant seat via the eyelet 22 to the bar 40 of the shopping cart. Another lock 24 can be provided at the other side of the shopping cart seat to secure the other eyelet 22 to the bar 40. As would be known to those of skill in the art, other locking devices, e.g., conventional padlocks or combination locks could be used in place of the lock 24 described.

Although the present invention has been described in relation to particular embodiments thereof, many other variations and modifications and other uses will become apparent to those skilled in the art. Therefore, the present invention should be limited not by the specific disclosure herein, but only by the appended claims.