Multi-functional catering container
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional catering containers are inadequate for simultaneously carrying food and beverages, leading to inconvenience and increased environmental pollution due to the need for plastic bags.
Innovation Solution
A multi-functional catering container with a plate structure, featuring a placement hole for a drink container and two extendable storage units for food, allowing for interlocking and folding to form a compact shape, enabling users to carry both food and beverages with one hand.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a conventional single-purpose carton is used to contain food, then the structure is simple and easy to manufacture, but it cannot accommodate beverages, requiring consumers to carry separate beverage containers which increases inconvenience and environmental pollution
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines a food container and a beverage container into a single integrated unit. The food container includes a placement cavity for food items and a beverage placement structure that holds a beverage container, eliminating the need for separate carrying of food and drink containers. This merging directly addresses the contradiction by achieving functional integration while maintaining manufacturing simplicity through unified structure design.
Solution Approach 2:
The container is designed to serve multiple functions: it can hold food items in the main cavity, accommodate a beverage container in the dedicated placement structure, and provide a hand holding structure for carrying. This multi-functionality resolves the contradiction by enabling a single structure to perform multiple roles that previously required separate containers.
2Ease of operation
If plastic bags are used to contain both food cartons and beverage containers, then carrying convenience is improved, but environmental pollution increases due to large quantity of plastic bag usage
Solution Approach 1:
By integrating the beverage container placement structure directly into the food container, the patent eliminates the need for external plastic bags to hold both items together. The unified structure allows consumers to carry food and beverages in a single container without requiring additional plastic packaging, thus reducing environmental pollution while maintaining carrying convenience.
3Adaptability or versatility
If drink cup placement structures are added to seat armrests, then beverage holding is improved, but no structures are provided for placing food such as popcorn and fried chicken, causing inconvenience
Solution Approach 1:
The patent integrates both beverage placement and food placement functionalities into a single container unit. The beverage placement structure holds drink containers while the main cavity accommodates food items like popcorn and fried chicken. This combined design provides comprehensive placement functionality without requiring separate structures for food and beverage, resolving the contradiction between adaptability and structural simplicity.
Data Source
AI summary
A multi-functional catering container is provided, including a loading body, a first storage unit, and a second storage unit. The loading body is a plate structure, a placement hole is provided on the loading body, and the placement hole is used to load a container. The first storage unit is disposed to extend from one side of the loading body, a bottom of the first storage unit is provided with a first bottom plane, a top of the first storage unit is provided with a first opening, and the first storage unit is used to accommodate food. The second storage unit is disposed to extend from another side of the loading body and opposite to the first storage unit, a bottom of the second storage unit is provided with a second bottom plane, and a top of the second storage unit is provided with a second opening.