Closure with built-in storing compartment

Abstract

The present invention is a closure (1) suitable for closing a container containing a first product, said closure being an assembly of less than four independent pieces, and having external side walls (3), a top wall (4), and an internal skirt (5) extending downwardly inside the side walls (3) from the top wall (4), characterized in that: (i) the internal skirt (5) comprises an opening disposed in the top wall (4) of the closure, said opening being closed by a membrane, so as to define at least one compartment to store a second product separately from said first product, and (ii) the membrane (11) closing the top wall opening is made of an oxygen-barrier material, so that said compartment (6) is free of oxygen contamination from ambient air when said closure (1) is screwed onto the neck (2) of said container.

Description

FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0001]The present invention concerns a closure with built-in storing compartment. More particularly, it is directed to a closure with a storing compartment having oxygen-barrier properties.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0002]For a long time, closures for containers have been developed, which allow to pack a first ingredient or mix of ingredient into the main container, while another ingredient or mix of ingredients is contained in a smaller receptacle located into the closure. Such packaging systems allow to store for an extended period of time, in the same packaging, ingredients that would otherwise react or degrade when put in contact before the storage period. In this case, the consumer opens the closure receptacle and mixes the product contained into said receptacle into the product contained into the main container, immediately prior to consumption.[0003]Such packaging closing systems have been described in various prior art documents, some of which are herea...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0014](ii) the closing means closing the top wall opening is made of an oxygen-barrier material, so that said compartment is free of oxygen contamination from ambient air when said closure is screwed onto the neck of said container.

[0022]A closure according to the present invention can advantageously comprise an internal skirt that is a cylinder having at least one vertical wall extending all along its height so as to divide said compartment into at least two sub-compartments. In this way, it is possible to pack and store two or more products separately in each sub-compartment of the closure, under powder, gel, liquid, or other form.

Problems solved by technology

All of the above described closures fail in providing an economic and easy to use solution.

The problem in the solutions of the prior art described above is that the overall cost of the package is multiplied by 3 to 5, because of the cost of the closure.

This is clearly not acceptable as these higher costs have then to be forwarded to the end consumer, who pays a higher price than normal for the product.

Such consumers as children, teenagers, elderly or disabled people, may have difficulties in performing correctly all the operations required for opening the closures described above, for instance, screwing then unscrewing the closure, or opening a portion of the closure, then press onto an element to rupture a membrane, or such other mechanical manipulations of the closure as squeezing, pressing, pulling, twisting or similar.

Shortly said, all closure solutions requiring a determined sequence of handling operations to release the closure contents into the main container, are not sufficiently consumer friendly.

Sensitive products to be packed in the closure must therefore be protected from moisture and oxygen through expensive technologies and packages, during the transfer between the closure filling line and the bottles closing line.

What is more, hygiene treatments to the closure prior to its positioning onto the bottles are very difficult to achieve technically, although required.

Last, but not least, the fact that the closure needs to be filled separately from the bottle closing step requires that a stock of pre-filled closures is made, because forecasts of production of bottles are difficult to plan.

This stock of pre-filled closures is not necessarily adequate and sometimes leads to waste of prefilled closures when the number of bottles to be capped is not as high as the closure stock that was constituted.

Given the price of product filled into the closures, such a waste is highly undesirable for economic reasons.

Images