Merchandising – Customer service – Store service
Reexamination Certificate
2002-10-29
2004-09-21
Frech, Karl D. (Department: 2876)
Merchandising
Customer service
Store service
C186S061000, C186S066000, C186S067000, C211S085150, C211S129100, C235S375000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06793043
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to improved methods and apparatus for register checkout. More particularly, the present invention provides a triangular turntable or carousel to improve the efficiency of bagging products as they are checked and the delivering of bagged products to customers for loading into their cart or for carrying from a store.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Register checkout stations are a familiar aspect of the shopping experience. Particularly in grocery and large retail stores, it is common to find an arrangement
10
in which a customer unloads a shopping cart or basket of items onto a conveyor belt
12
which conveys the items to a cashier or checker who then scans them utilizing a bar code scanner
14
. The checker typically stands beside a point of sale (POS) terminal
15
. The scanned items are then placed by the checker onto an inclined ramp or a second conveyor
16
which conveys them to a collection area
18
from which the checker, a dedicated bagger, or in some cases the customer then bags them.
FIG.
1
A and the remaining figures are not drawn to scale; however, break lines
17
and
17
′ and
19
are included in
FIG. 1A
to indicate that the second conveyor
16
and collection area
18
will typically be longer than illustrated so that it will be understood that arrangement
10
of
FIG. 1A
has a relatively large footprint and the distance “d” from the checker's normal scanning position proximate to said scanner
14
and terminal
15
to the back of collection area
18
where scanned items collect is a relatively long distance requiring the checker to walk several steps to do bagging if not assisted by another individual dedicated to bagging who is able to bag as quickly as the checker can scan and check out the customer.
A much more compact arrangement
20
is shown in FIG.
1
B. In the arrangement
20
, the customer again places items onto a conveyor
22
which conveys them to the checker who scans them utilizing a scanner
24
and then places the items directly into one or more bags
25
and
26
hanging from a supporting rack or racks
27
located after scanner
24
and before an optional catch area
28
. For the approach of arrangement
20
, the checker can bag scanned items directly with little foot movement from a position adjacent scanner
24
and POS terminal
25
.
However, both of the above described approaches require the checker to engage in a large number of potentially unnecessary movements such as walking from the scanning position to the bagging area for an arrangement such as the arrangement
10
of
FIG. 1A
, or lifting full bags, such as bags
25
and
26
from below the level of the counter up over and across the checkout counter and then placing them up on the counter for the customer, or even lowering these bags into the customer's cart in an arrangement, such as that of FIG.
1
B.
Two alternative arrangements
210
and
220
shown in
FIGS. 2A and 2B
, respectively, proposed an octagonal carrousel
212
for eight bags or a rectangular carousel
222
for four bags to replace the approaches of
FIG. 1A
or
1
B. The eight bag octagonal unit results in a relatively large footprint, as the octagonal carousel
212
turns within a circle having diameter D. The checker also needs to frequently turn the unit to continue to feed bags into a position for loading. Also, a checker needs to turn the unit through several positions to rotate bags to a position where the customer can take his or her bag or bags. By way of example, the bag at position A in
FIG. 2A
has to be rotated all the way to position B before it can be readily accessed by the customer. Conversely, the rectangular four bag unit requires a 180 degree turn to get a new set of empty bags into position for loading. With this rotation, the bagged items are now placed somewhat inconveniently for unloading as the customer may wish to stay adjacent the bar code scanner to receive change, sign a credit receipt or the like. The 180 degree rotation is also unnecessarily time consuming and therefore is inefficient. Because of the large number of rotations occurring in a typical checker's shift even a small difference may be significant.
A further retail store checkout device is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,131,499 which is incorporated by reference in its entirety. The described device includes a rotating carousel for use in conjunction with plastic bags. The preferred form of the device of the above patent has six triangular compartments for holding bags.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Among its other aspects, the present invention advantageously provides a small footprint device which with a single clockwise or counterclockwise rotation of approximately 120° carries filled bags to a position from which customers can readily load them into their carts while leaving a reserve of empty bags for the checker to continue bagging further items into. To this end, according to one aspect of the present invention, a triangular carousel is provided for three pairs of two side by side bags. These side by side bags allow the ready separation of products such as frozen foods, chemicals such as cleaning products and the like from other products which are typically separated from those products by checkers of grocery or other products. Large or bulky items such as a gallon of milk, large packages of pet food, a twelve pack of soda or the like can be placed on a top triangular surface of the carousel in a single motion as the checker swipes the item across the scanner. When a checker rotates the last bags of a customer's items for loading, the checker can then immediately begin bagging items for the next customer in line while the previous customer loads his or her cart. Thus, the present invention may increase productivity, decrease customer waiting, and increase customer satisfaction through greater control of the bagging process.
These and other advantages of the present invention will be apparent from the drawings and the Detailed Description which follows below.
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Frech Karl D.
Priest & Goldstein PLLC
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
Walsh Daniel
LandOfFree
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