Adjustable Compartment Tray for Product Display
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing shipping and display containers require separate inserts or excess material to accommodate different product sizes and counts, leading to increased complexity and cost, and fail to provide optimal visual exposure and stackability.
Innovation Solution
A one-piece corrugated paperboard tray with adjustable buffers and dividers that forms multiple compartments of varying sizes, allowing for efficient pallet, truck, and shelf fitments, while preventing nesting, and featuring pre-glued panels for easy assembly.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If separate inserts or excess material are used to accommodate different product sizes and counts, then adaptability to different products is improved, but device complexity and material cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The tray is divided into multiple compartments of different sizes within a single integrated structure. The blank is segmented into regions that form compartments of varying dimensions, allowing different product sizes to be accommodated simultaneously without requiring separate inserts for each product type.
Solution Approach 2:
The single tray structure serves multiple functions: it provides the base container, creates compartment dividers, and forms adjustable buffers all from one integrated blank. This multi-functional design eliminates the need for separate inserts or additional material components, achieving adaptability while maintaining structural simplicity.
2Adaptability or versatility
If multiple pieces of dividers and inserts are used to accommodate different products, then adaptability is improved, but manufacturing cost and assembly labor increase
Solution Approach 1:
Multiple functional elements (base tray, dividers, and buffers) are merged into a single integrated blank. The blank is constructed as one piece that is subsequently divided into compartments through folding and forming operations, eliminating the need to manufacture and assemble multiple separate components.
Solution Approach 2:
The blank is pre-configured with fold lines and buffer sections during manufacturing. The dividers and compartment structures are preliminarily formed as integral parts of the blank, requiring only simple folding and gluing operations during final assembly rather than complex multi-component construction.
3Adaptability or versatility
If adjustable buffers are added to accommodate different product sizes, then adaptability is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The buffers are designed as adjustable elements that can be repositioned or reconfigured within the compartments. This dynamic capability allows the compartment effective size to be adapted to different product dimensions while maintaining the overall simple single-blank structure, as the adjustability is achieved through simple buffer movement rather than complex mechanisms.
Data Source
AI summary
The present invention is directed to a shipping and display tray a having a bottom wall, a front wall, a back wall, and a pair of opposed side walls foldably joined with one another for holding different products contained therein in an upright position at a point of sale. The shipping and display tray comprising a one-piece shallow tray having a plurality of different sizes of compartments each of which contains a different product size and count therein. Each of the plurality of different sizes of compartments includes an adjustable buffer configured to change the size of the compartment and to accommodate the different product size and count while maintaining a fixed perimeter or outside dimension of the one-piece shallow tray.