Technical field

The present invention relates to a system for grouping together and transporting a plurality of bottles, in particular bottles for food products, such as for example bottles for milk, bottles for fruit juices or other beverages, etc..

More specifically, the invention relates to a system for grouping together and transporting bottles which makes use of less material, which is easy to transport, even with one hand only, and which allows to easily pile the groups of bottles one upon the other.

State of the art

Systems for grouping together bottles and allowing the user to transport them as a single body are known. For example, plastic components which enclose the bottles to be transported and are provided on their top with a handle to allow the user to transport them are commonly used. Cardboard boxes of parallelepiped shape in which the bottles to be transported are accommodated are also known. Furthermore, systems which combine a cardboard base on which the bottles to be transported are placed and a plastic film arranged around the bottles are known; these systems may also have separation walls made of cardboard interposed between the rows of bottles to be transported.

These known systems are however characterized by a significant use of material, which results in high manufacturing costs and great environmental impact. Moreover, these known systems are very bulky, and therefore once the bottles have been removed these systems uselessly take up a lot of space.

Additionally, these known systems do not allow to easily pile the groups of bottles one upon the other.

Summary

It is an object of the present invention to provide a system for grouping together and transporting bottles which represents an improvement over the prior art, in particular which does not suffer from the aforementioned drawbacks of the prior art.

This and other objects are fully achieved by virtue of a system as defined in the enclosed independent claim 1 .

Preferred embodiments of the system according to the present invention are the subject-matter of the dependent claims.

In short, the invention is based on the idea of using, as a system for grouping together and transporting bottles, a single sheet of corrugated cardboard comprising a lower portion with two opposite faces, on each of which at least one adhesive element is provided to allow adhesion of a respective bottle to the lower portion of the sheet. Since the system only consists in a sheet of cardboard, it makes use of very little material, takes up very little space and is also very light.

The lower portion and the upper portion of the sheet are separated by a separation line about which the upper portion can be folded on one side or the other with respect to the lower portion, in such a manner that the sheet is able to take a first configuration, in which the upper portion is coplanar with the lower portion to allow a user to grasp the sheet, along with the bottles attached to the lower portion of the sheet, and a second configuration, in which the upper portion is arranged at a right angle to the lower portion. Moreover, the upper portion of the sheet has a plurality of openings positioned and sized so as to allow, in the second configuration of the sheet, the neck of each bottle attached to the lower portion of the sheet to be inserted into a respective opening of the upper portion of the sheet. In this manner, when the sheet is in the aforementioned second configuration, it does not protrude upwards with respect to the bottles and therefore does not hinder the piling of the groups of bottles one upon the other.

The number of bottles the system is able to transport may be chosen depending on the specific application: the system may be for example configured to transport four, six or more bottles. Preferably, the number of bottles is an even number, so that the same numbers of bottles are attached to the two faces.

Preferably, at least two adhesive elements for each bottle to be transported are provided on each face of the lower portion of the flat sheet, thereby ensuring that each bottle firmly and properly adheres to the flat sheet.

Preferably, the adhesive elements associated to each bottle are arranged in columns, i.e. vertically aligned with each other. Each face of the lower portion of the flat sheet has in this case groups of adhesive elements arranged in columns, so as to allow to arrange the bottles one beside the other on each face.

According to an embodiment, an upper set with two or more adhesive elements, vertically aligned with each other, and a lower set with two or more adhesive elements, vertically aligned with each other and vertically aligned with the adhesive elements of the upper set, are provided for each bottle intended to be transported by means of the system. The adhesive elements of each set are placed at a distance from each other smaller than the distance between the upper set and the lower set (said distance being the distance between the lowermost adhesive element of the upper set and the uppermost adhesive element of the lower set).

The adhesive elements are preferably configured in such a manner as to have a level of adhesion to the cardboard of the sheet higher than the level of adhesion to the material of the bottles. It is thus ensured that when the bottle is detached from the sheet, the adhesive remains attached to the sheet and therefore there are no remaining traces of adhesive on the bottle that may disturb the subsequent use of the bottle.

The adhesive elements are advantageously made as removable elements, so that they can be detached from the sheet and reattached on the same sheet, for example in a position different from the previous one to better adapt themselves to a different bottle format.

Further features of the system according to the present invention will be apparent from the following detailed description, given purely by way of non-limiting example.

Brief description of the drawings

In the following detailed description of the invention reference will be made to the Figures of the attached drawings, wherein Figures 1 and 2 are perspective views showing a system for grouping together and transporting bottles according to an embodiment of the present invention, with and without bottles, respectively.

Detailed description

With reference to Figures 1 and 2, a system for grouping together and transporting bottles B, in particular plastic bottles for food products, according to an embodiment of the present invention is generally indicated 10.

The system 10 comprises a single sheet 12 of corrugated cardboard on the opposite faces of which the bottles B are intended to be attached by gluing. In the illustrated embodiment, the system 10 is configured to group together and transport four bottles B, two of which are attached to a face of the sheet 12 and the other two are attached to the opposite face, but of course the system may be configured for a different number of bottles B (higher or lower than four). Preferably, though not necessarily, the number of bottles B is an even number, so that the same number of bottles B are attached to the two faces of the sheet 12.

In the illustrated embodiment, the sheet 12 has a rectangular shape, with a lower horizontal side 12a, an upper horizontal side 12b parallel to the lower horizontal side 12a, and a pair of vertical sides 12c perpendicular to the two horizontal sides 12a and 12b. Preferably, the upper horizontal side 12b is connected to each of the two vertical sides 12c by a respective fillet or chamfer 12d. In the illustrated example a chamfer, i.e. a straight segment, inclined for example by 45 degrees to the upper horizontal side 12b, is provided, but alternatively a fillet, i.e. an arc of circumference, might be provided.

The sheet 12 integrally includes a lower portion 14 and an upper portion 16. The lower portion 14 has the function of attachment portion for attachment of the bottles B, whereas the upper portion 16 has the function of gripping portion for the user.

The lower portion 14 and the upper portion 16 are separated by a line L, and at that line a folding region is provided in the sheet 12 to allow the user to fold the upper portion 16 on one side or the other with respect to the lower portion 14 to reduce the size in height of the system, in particular to allow to pile more systems 10, with the respective bottles B, one upon the other. The sheet 12 can therefore take a first configuration (not shown in the drawings), in which the upper portion 16 is coplanar with the lower portion 12 to allow the user to grasp the sheet 12, along with the bottles B attached to the lower portion 14, and a second configuration (shown in Figures 1 and 2), in which the upper portion 16 is arranged at a right angle to the lower portion 14 to allow to pile the groups of bottles B one upon the other.

Adhesive elements 18 are provided on the two faces of the lower portion 14 of the sheet 12 (whereas the upper portion 16 does not have such elements), by means of which elements each bottle B can be detachably fixed to the sheet 12. The adhesive elements 18 are preferably configured so as to have a level of adhesion to the sheet 12 higher than the level of adhesion to the bottles B.

Preferably, at least two adhesive elements 18 are provided on the lower portion 14 of the sheet 12 for each bottle B to be transported, so as to ensure a proper and firm adhesion of the bottle B to the sheet 12. In this case, the adhesive elements 18 associated to each bottle B are advantageously arranged so as to be vertically aligned with each other. Each face of the lower portion 14 of the sheet 12 has then groups of adhesive elements 18 arranged in columns, thereby allowing to arrange the bottles B one beside the other on each face.

More specifically, as in the illustrated embodiment, an upper set 20 with two or more adhesive elements 18, vertically aligned with each other, and a lower set 22 with two or more adhesive elements 18, vertically aligned with each other and vertically aligned with the adhesive elements 18 of the upper set 20, may be provided for each bottle B. The adhesive elements 18 of each set 20 and 22 are placed at a distance from each other smaller than the distance between the upper set 20 and the lower set 22 (said distance being the distance between the lowermost adhesive element 18 of the upper set 20 and the uppermost adhesive element 18 of the lower set 22).

As can be realized from the drawings, the bottles B are preferably arranged with the respective lateral surfaces in contact with each other so as to minimize the overall space taken up by the group of bottles carried by the system 10.

The sheet 12 is higher than the bottles B, in such a manner that in the aforesaid first configuration the upper portion 16 of the sheet 12 protrudes upwards with respect to the bottles B and can be grasped by the hand of the user for allowing transport of the system 10, along with the bottles B.

In the aforesaid second configuration, as shown in Figures 1 and 2, the upper portion 16 of the sheet 12 is folded at line L at a right angle to the lower portion 14, on the side of a first face of that portion. In this configuration, therefore, the upper portion 16 of the sheet 12 extends horizontally, whereas the lower portion 14 extends vertically. The upper portion 16 of the sheet 12 has one or more openings 26, in particular of circular shape, into each of which the neck C of a bottle B attached to the aforesaid first face of the lower portion 14 of the sheet 12 is inserted. Naturally, the openings 26 will be suitably positioned so as to be aligned each with a respective bottle B, in particular with the neck C of the bottle, when the bottle is attached to the lower portion 14 of the sheet 12 by means of the adhesive elements 18.

The present invention has been described herein with reference to a preferred embodiment thereof. It is intended that other embodiments may be provided for, which share with the one described herein the same inventive core, as defined by the scope of the attached claims.