EP0606828A1

EP0606828A1 - Pivotal price-card holder for shop shelves

Info

Publication number: EP0606828A1
Application number: EP93830006A
Authority: EP
Inventors: Carlo Monterisi
Original assignee: SYNCO ITALIANA Srl
Current assignee: SYNCO ITALIANA Srl
Priority date: 1993-01-13
Filing date: 1993-01-13
Publication date: 1994-07-20

Abstract

Promotional messages or price tags of size substantially wider than the thickness of a shelf of a rack shelf onto which articles for sale are stored and which would therefore interfere with the access to the storing space underneath the shelf, are supported in an oscillating manner by means of slidable clips. The clips may be mounted on an existing price tag molding of the front edge of the shelf. The clip with an oscillating arm object of the invention, may be made in different forms adapted for being mounted on price tag moldings of the so-called pocket-type or on price tag moldings having a "C" cross section. In the first instance, the clip of the invention provides also a virtual "C"-shaped guide for eventually mounting a standard slot-type clip for "flag-mounted" promotional cards.

Description

In modernly equipped shops, especially, though not exclusively, organized as "self-services", it is fundamental to keep a certain stock of articles for sale visibly arranged on shelves and easily reachable for being picked up by customers or by shop assistants. It is also indispensable to show the price of the articles in an easily readable manner.
For the latter reason, the shelves are normally provided along their front edge with a molding either in the form of a metal or plastic guide having a cross section in front of a "C" or having a "U"-shaped cross section, so as to constitute a "pocket" with at least the front leg or portion of the "U" transparent.
Price tags indicating the price of the products may be slidably inserted in the "C" guide or in the "pocket-like" transparent molding and placed in correspondence of the articles disposed on the shelf. Price tags or other selling message cards that may be displayed in this manner may have a maximum height that cannot be larger than the "thickness" of the shelf (or of the height of the front molding of the shelf). In other words, the tags cannot significantly stick up or down of the plane of the shelf.
Another requirement of remarkable economical importance is that of offering for sale (dispos on the shelves) a variety as large as possible of products per unit of exposition area of the shop. Such a requirement implies the necessity of fully exploiting the available space for exposition, by adjusting the height of separation among shelves so as to make the most of the available area. In other words, the distance between shelves is often the minimum that is just sufficient for storing the articles on the plane of the lower shelf, so as to fully exploit the useful height of rack shelves.
In these conditions, the above described system of displaying price tags and sale messages is the only usable one in practice. This, though acceptable from a purely functional point of view, notwithstanding the fact that the so displayed price tags are relatively difficult to read in view of the relative smallness of the tags that may be inserted in the shelf molding, impedes the use of price tag holders of a larger size or the use of advertising cards for attracting attention to articles offered at special sale conditions, etc.. In fact, these implements necessarily should have a size that is much larger than the thickness of the shelves (i.e. the height of the molding).
Any price tag holder or promotional message card that has a size larger than the height of the shelf's molding would interfere with the picking-up of the products from the shelf laying underneath and which often have a height which is substantially equal to the separation between the shelves or are stacked up to fill up completely the space between two shelves.
The present invention provides an effective solution to the problem by using a special clip that may be slidably and removably hooked to or snapped on a standard price tag holding, shelf's molding, whether the latter has a "C" or a "U" (pocket-like) cross section. The clip object of the present invention has a pivotally mounted arm that is free to oscillate and that may support a price tag or a promotional card holder, which desirably may have a sufficiently large size (i.e. a height much larger than the thickness of the shelf) and which therefore would interfere with the picking-up of articles from the shelf below. The ability of the price tag or promotional card holder that is fastened to the pivotal arm of the clip, to oscillate freely, allows extraction of articles, though interfering with the card or price tag, without any problem. Even if during extraction of an article the price tag or promotional card holder is compliantly raised, it freely falls back in position after having interferingly picked up an article from the shelf below.
Moreover, the clip of the invention may usefully be provided with a front seat or guide having a "C" profile, capable of receiving a second clip of a so-called slot-type, suitable for displaying "flag-mounted promotional cards.
The different aspects and advantages of the device of the invention will become more evident through the following description of several embodiments thereof and by referring to the annexed drawings, wherein:

Figure 1 is a schematic view of a clip made according to a first embodiment showing how the clip hooks into a "U" shaped price tag molding of a shelf;
Figure 2 shows the clip of Fig. 1 standing alone;
Figure 3 illustrates how the body of the clip of Figures 1 and 2 may provide a support for mounting thereon a slot-type clip for displaying "flag-mounted" cards;
Figure 4 shows an alternative embodiment of the clip of the invention, suitable for a price-tag molding having a "C" profile.

With reference to Fig. 1, a shelf of a rack-shelf structure for storing articles for sales, is provided with a "pocket-type" molding M (having a "U" profile), at least the front portion of which is made of transparent material. The molding is permanently fixed along the front edge of the shelf. The "U" profile of the molding M permits to insert therein price tags (usually printed by a computer) for indicating the price of articles arranged on the plane of the shelf.
The clip object of the present invention is composed of a anchoring body 1, provided on a back side thereof of a hook shaped part 2, capable of being inserted into the "U" cross section molding of the shelf. A projection 3, which may be provided of one or preferably as shown of two crests or ridges 3a and 3b, at different "levels" among each other, and corresponding to one and to another standard height of moldings M as commonly used for shop shelves. Depending upon the type of molding M, either the crest 3a or the crest 3b of the projection 3 of the body of the clip of the invention, may be forced to pass over the lower edge of the molding, thus completing a snap-on assemblying of the body 1 of the clip onto the molding M of the shelf. Of course, the body 1 of the clip, after having been mounted with said snap-on action on the molding M, may be slided along the molding itself for positioning it according to need in correspondence of products to be specially marked and which may be arranged on a shelf (not shown in the figures) directly under the shelf onto the front edge of which the clip is mounted.
On a front face thereof, the clip body 1 is provided with a seat 4 suitable to pivotally hold substantially horizontally and a pin 6 of an oscillating arm 5 capable to support a price tag or a promotion card holder or alike. The price tag or promotional card holder (not shown in the figure), may extend well below the bottom face of the shelf and therefore may interfere with the storing space below the shelf itself, where normally articles to be "marked" by the price tag or card holder will be stocked. The articles, arranged on a shelf plane underneath the shelf shown in Fig. 1, though they may have a height that is close to the separation distance between the two shelves, may nevertheless be freely extracted, in view of the fact that the eventually interfering price tag or promotional card will remain free to be rotatably raised of what necessary to extract or pick-up the article from the shelf plane below the shelf carrying the price tag or promotional card holder, being sustained by the arm 5 of the clip that is free to oscillate.
Of course, the oscillating arm 5 of the clip may take any suitable form. It may be provided for example with a hole or with a spring-clip for fastening a card or price tag or of any other equivalent fastening device.
In the case shown in the figures, the oscillating sustaining arm 5 terminates with a tail portion 5a, which is shaped so as to snap-into a slot purposely shaped to receive the tail end 5a, which may be present on the rear face of a price tag or promotional card holder frame.
Most advantageously, the front face of the body 1 of the clip of the invention may have a "C" shaped profile, as defined by the two projections 7 and 8. This increases the utility of the clip of the invention.
As shown in Fig. 3, when "flag-mounted" promotional card must be displayed along a shelf, the pin 6 of the oscillating arm 5 may be forcibly extracted from the supporting seat 4 of the clip and, on the body 1 of the clip which may be mounted with a snap-on action on a "pocket-type" molding M of a shop shelf (Fig. 1), a slot-type clip 9 of a known type, may be mounted on the body 1 of the clip. In this way, the clip 1 of the invention, once has been freed of the oscillating arm 5, virtually provides a "C" guide for hooking therein a slot-type clip of standard type in shop shelves having a price tag molding of the pocket-type (i.e. having a "U" cross section), which would not be suitable for receiving a standard slot-type clip.
For better clarity of illustration, the clip of the invention is also shown isolately in Fig. 2.
The pin 6 may be solidly part of the oscillating arm 5 or may be rotatably mounted into a fork-shaped extremity of the arm 5.
The clip of the invention may also be made in an alternative form, suitably to be used on price tag molding having a "C" cross section. This alternative embodiment is depicted in Fig. 4.
In this case, the shelf is provided with a molding M1 having substantially a "C" shaped cross section, into which printed price tags may be flexibly inserted. The clip of the invention comprises a body 12 provided with two wings 13 and 14, that are capable of being flexed and inserted into the "C" guide, constituted by the molding M of the front edge of the shelf.
In this alternative embodiment, the clip is provided with a seat 4 capable of sustaining the pin 6 of a oscillating arm 5, capable of sustaining a price tag or promotional card holder or similar object. The price tag or promotional card holder (not shown in figure) may extend below the level of the shelf onto which the clip is mounted and therefore may interfere with the access to the storing space below the shelf wherein normally articles to be marked by the price tag or by the promotional card will be stored. Also in this case, the price tag or promotional card will be free to be rotatably raised what necessary for completing the picking up of the article from the space below the shelf, being sustained by the oscillating arm 5 of the clip.
The clip object of the invention offers the advantage of adapting itself to retrofit existing price tag molding of shop shelves, thus permitting a combined use of the two systems of visual communication. The clips may in fact be used for "marking" certain products, and/or for displaying promotional messages, moreover, in case of pocket-type price tag moldings, the clip of the invention usefully provides a slidable support onto which a standard slot-type clip for "flag-mounted" cards may be mounted.

Claims

A clip slidably mountable on an existing molding (M, M1) of a shelf of a rack shelf for storing articles on sale, for displaying a price or a promotional message, characterized by comprising
a body (1, 12) having projections (2, 3, 13, 14) capable of slidably snapping-on said molding (M, M1), a seat (4) for rotatably supporting an oscillating arm (5) onto which a price tag or promotional card holder may be fastened, said oscillating arm having a pin (6) rotatably supported in said seat (4).
A clip according to claim 1, characterized by the fact that said body (1) has a hook-shaped extension (2) and a projecting part (3) capable of forcibly flexing and pass over with a snap-on action the lower edge of a pocket-type molding (M).
A clip according to claim 1, characterized by the fact that said body (12) has wings (13, 14) capable of forcibly flexing and fitting into a "C" cross section molding (M1).
A clip according to claim 1, characterized by the fact that said oscillating arm (5) is provided with means (5a) for fastening thereto a price tag or a promotional card holder.
A clip according to claim 2, characterized by the fact that said fastening means comprise a tail portion (5a) of said oscillating arm, capable of coupling through a snap action in a receiving slot present on the rear of a price tag or promotional card holding frame.
A clip according to claim 2, characterized by the fact that said body (1) has a front portion having a "C" cross-section, suitable to receive therein a slot-type clip for sustaining a flag-mounted promotional card.