JP2007015704A - Information managing system for distribution of article - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To make merchandise information management in a distribution field efficient to prevent errors from occurring, and to provide a highly reliable information managing system for distribution of the articles. <P>SOLUTION: The information managing system for distribution of the articles has a process for printing an information code on a packaging container when the packaging containers are continuously manufactured, a process for packaging the article in the packaging container manufactured, and a process for recording the information of the article in a database corresponding to the information code. In the information managing system for distribution of the articles, the information code is a bar code. In the information managing system for distribution of the articles, the printing method is an inkjet recording system. In the information managing system for distribution of the articles, an active energy ray curable ink is used. In the information managing system for distribution of the articles, the packaging container is a corrugated fiberboard case. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2007,JPO&INPIT

Description

  The present invention relates to a distribution information management system for articles by printing an information code on a packaging container.

In recent years, due to increasing consumer needs for quality assurance of various products, especially perishable food products, it has become necessary to write various information such as date of manufacture and production location on the packaging in order to provide traceability to the product. Yes.
Normally, when packaging fresh food, etc. at the production location, the product is shipped on a cardboard case that has been pre-printed with information on the production location and producer name using a method such as text or barcode, and the distribution process. The company is able to retroactively collect various information about the product.
However, with such a method, production information for each box of products packed in a large number of boxes cannot be traced back.
In other words, packaging materials that are mass-produced such as cardboard cases used for distribution are currently produced at high speed and in large quantities by plate-type printing machines. It was practically impossible to change the plates.
In other words, products packed in boxes with the same information printed cannot be identified even if the production date or harvest area is different, and it is very difficult to elucidate the cause when an accident occurs. become.

  Further, a technique for printing a barcode or the like on a corrugated cardboard sheet by an ink jet method is disclosed (Patent Document 1). This application is intended to perform high-definition printing simply on an irregular surface such as a corrugated cardboard sheet. Thus, no proposal has been made regarding a distribution information management system for articles that print and manage information codes of contents as described above.

Also, at the stage of product packaging, technology that directly prints product information on a packaging container with a barcode printer, pastes product information printed on a label, etc., or pastes information written on an IC chip Is also known (Patent Document 2), but it is a burden on the operator and causes a reduction in work efficiency. Furthermore, since human work is involved in the work, there is an unavoidable occurrence of a human error, and there is a possibility that wrong product information is provided to consumers and users.
Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 11-309848 JP 2004-78743 A

  An object of the present invention is to provide an article distribution information management system with high reliability, which improves the efficiency of information management of merchandise at distribution sites and prevents the occurrence of errors.

  The first aspect of the present invention is the step of printing the information code on the packaging container when continuously manufacturing the packaging container, the step of packaging the article in the packaging container manufactured as described above, the information on the article, and the A distribution information management system for articles having a process of recording an information code in a database in association with the information code.

  A second aspect of the present invention is the article distribution information management system according to the first aspect of the present invention, wherein the information code is a bar code.

  3rd of this invention is a distribution information management system of the articles | goods in any one of 1-2 of this invention whose printing method is an inkjet recording system.

  A fourth aspect of the present invention is the article distribution information management system according to the third aspect of the present invention using an active energy ray curable ink.

  5th of this invention is the distribution information management system of the articles | goods in any one of 1st-4th of this invention whose packaging container is a cardboard case.

  According to the present invention, it is possible to improve the efficiency of product information management at a distribution site to prevent the occurrence of errors, and to obtain a highly reliable product distribution information management system.

  In the present invention, an apparatus used for continuously producing packaging containers is a flexo multicolor corrugated cardboard printing box making machine (flexo folder) generally used as a box making machine when the packaging container is a cardboard case. Gluer, hereinafter referred to as FFG).

In the process of manufacturing the packaging container, an article is packaged in a packaging container on which an information code is printed to form a package. At that time, the information code printed on the packaging container and the information of the article to be packaged And correspondingly recording them in the database.
The database is formed in the non-volatile memory area in the computer main body having the central control unit, the volatile memory area, the non-volatile memory area, and the communication device. The non-volatile memory area may be any of IC memory, hard disk, DVD and the like.

When storing the printed information code in the database, it is necessary to read the printed information and communicate with the computer body. For example, it can be done by using a barcode reader, OCR reader, etc. Become.
Information on an article to be packaged (hereinafter abbreviated as article information) is stored in a database in association with the information code. At this time, the article information may be manually input from a keyboard or a computer. It may be used with reference to article information stored in a memory area in the body. Or you may read the barcode attached to goods or a dummy article, and may use the information. The dummy article is a dummy article printed with a barcode, which is used when it is difficult to print the barcode on the article itself, such as that used at a supermarket cash register.

In the present invention, the database is a set of records including at least one information code and at least one field (item) for storing item information, and one record corresponds to one packaging container.
One record may have fields other than the information code and article information, and information other than the information code and article information may be recorded after the article information is stored.

In this way, the information code of the packaging container is recorded in the database in correspondence with the information code of the packaging container, and the information code of the contents is read from the packaging container by reading the information code of the packaging container and referring to the database. Can be easily obtained.
The advantage of such a system is that it is much more information than the amount of data that can be recorded in the information code itself by managing the information of the article itself by a database rather than printing the information of the article on the packaging container itself. It is possible to manage the information on the articles after packaging the articles very easily because it is possible to manage the data and to update and correct the data sequentially on the database.

  Further, when printing the information code on the packaging container, a different information code may be printed for each packaging container, or the same information code may be printed for each arbitrary number group. This can be arbitrarily determined according to the article to be packaged.

In the manufacturing process of the packaging container, the distributor who purchased the packaging container on which the information code has been printed in advance wraps the article, and at the same time, registers various information of the article to be packaged in the database in correspondence with the information code. It is possible to record information on the packaged article in the packaging container.
That is, even if the distributor does not print the barcode or the like independently, the contents of the package and the traceability information can be made to correspond to the package by using the already printed information code.
According to this method, the trouble of printing barcodes in the distribution process can be saved, and not only the efficiency of handling can be improved, but also there is no risk of erroneous information being printed due to mistakes at the work site.

  The system of the present invention exerts a great effect when the total number of lots in the manufacturing process of the packaging container is relatively large, there are many variations of articles to be packaged, and the number of various articles is small. For example, by printing different codes on 100,000 cardboard cases in advance, all these cardboard cases can be handled as individual objects (IDs) at the distribution stage. According to the system of the present invention, it is possible to manage such a large amount of information, which has been difficult until now, very easily and at low cost.

  In the present invention, the information code can be used without particular limitation as long as it is used for identifying information such as letters, numbers, symbols, and bar codes. It can be read by a reading device. However, among these, it is desirable to use a bar code for which optical reading technology is established. There are one-dimensional and two-dimensional barcodes, but either one can be used in the present invention. For example, JAN is a typical barcode recording method. According to this method, any number of 13 to 8 digits can be recorded in association with the barcode.

In this invention, when manufacturing the said packaging container continuously, the process of printing an information code on a packaging container is provided. As a means for printing such an information code, it is preferable to use a digital printing technique for controlling the printing contents with digital information.
As printing means using such digital printing technology, there are plateless printing technology by ink jet printing method and electrophotographic method, or plate printing technology by high-speed plate making, but in the case of the present invention, the printing contents are individually changed. Plateless printing which is easy to do is preferable, and an inkjet method is preferable as the printing means.

There are various ink jet methods depending on the head drive method, ink type, operable speed, etc., but a method particularly suitable for the method of the present invention is a drop-on-demand method from the viewpoint of operability. A head drive type is desirable.
It should be noted that the drive frequency of the ink jet recording head used in the present invention is 15 kHz or more because it is possible to perform recording at a high speed, and this is particularly suitable because it hardly reduces the productivity of the process.

  In addition, in the ink jet recording system, a system using an active energy ray curable ink is particularly preferable because the ink is dried instantaneously, the printing quality is good, and the apparatus is small. It is.

In the present invention, the above-described information code is printed on the packaging container. For example, in the case of fruits and vegetables, it is common that symbols such as vegetables and fruits are printed. For such symbols, the same symbol may be printed on all containers regardless of the information code, or a specific symbol may be printed for a certain group of information codes.
Furthermore, when filling the packaging container with articles and storing the article information corresponding to the information code in the database, a specific design or character corresponding to either the information code or the article information or a combination thereof. May be printed. The ink jet method is most suitable for printing at that time. In this way, for example, unique information such as the name of the producer can be printed after the article is filled. The symbols and unique information described here may be stored in advance in the memory area of the computer main body. It is preferable that the symbols and unique information are transmitted in advance from another place (for example, a producer) and stored in the memory area of the computer main body.

  Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail based on examples.

<Example 1>
(1) Box manufacturing process (printing information code on packaging containers)
An ink jet printing device and an ink curing UV lamp are installed immediately after the flexographic printing part of the FFG capable of three-color flexographic printing. The barcode was printed by inkjet printing using the UV curable ink, and the printed part was cured with a UV lamp. Subsequently, the box was made by a conventional method to obtain 500 cardboard cases. The printing / box making speed was 200 cases / minute.
The barcode printed by the above checks the customer code for the first 2 digits, the product type for the next 6 digits, the serial number from 1 to 500 for the next 4 digits, and the last 1 digit in a format that complies with the 13-digit JAN system. Digit.
Here, the customer code, the code corresponding to the product type, and the serial number are printed as a barcode corresponding to the information code of the present invention.
(2) Packaging process of goods (recording of article information corresponding to packaging container information code)
Boxed with agricultural products having different production data in the cardboard case printed with the barcode in (1). At that time, the serial number by the barcode attached to the cardboard case and the data at the time of production of the agricultural products were associated with each other (see Table 1), recorded in the database, and then shipped to the customer. Here, the cultivated land and the harvest date are stored in the database as article information referred to in the present invention.
In addition, when the data at the time of production of agricultural products and the serial number of the cardboard case are recorded in association with each other, they are recorded by a bar code management system used for in-store marking. Specifically, software that stores information in a database performs the following operations.
That is, the barcode printed on the cardboard box is read by the barcode reader on the belt conveyor on which the assembled empty cardboard boxes continuously flow, and the information is stored in one record. Next, after filling the box with the article, manually input the cultivation land and harvest date as article information from the keyboard and press the enter key to store the cultivation land and harvest date information in the above record. This software waits for input by a box barcode reader. At this time, the cultivated land and harvest date are set so that the previous data is input if the enter key is pressed without input.

(3) Distribution information management (reading of article information from the information code of the packaging container)
After shipping the agricultural product packaging obtained in (2), the customer reads the barcode attached to the cardboard case with a barcode reader and inquires the database to produce the production data of the agricultural product. Can be known instantly.
For example, if you want to know the production data of agricultural products packed in a cardboard case numbered with a 205-numbered barcode, read the data with a barcode reader and query the database to find B It turns out that the day is July 8th.

<Comparative Example 1>
(1) Box manufacturing process A 500 cardboard case was obtained in the same manner as in Example 1 except that barcode printing by inkjet printing was not performed.
(2) Packing process of goods In the corrugated cardboard case obtained by (1), agricultural products with different production data on the cultivated land and harvest date were packed and shipped without distinction.

<Comparative example 2>
(1) Box manufacturing process A 500 cardboard case was obtained by FFG in the same manner as in Example 1 except that barcode printing by inkjet printing was not performed.
(2) Boxing process of goods After printing the barcode by inkjet printing on the cardboard case obtained in (1), the agricultural products having different production data are boxed in the cardboard case printed with the barcode.
At that time, in the same way as in Example 1, the serial number by the barcode attached to the cardboard case and the data at the time of production of the agricultural products were associated with each other and recorded in the database, and then shipped to the customer.

Agricultural products shipped in the cardboard cases of Example 1 and Comparative Example 2 can be instantly inquired at the time of production when necessary, such as when quality problems occur at the customer. Is possible.
In Comparative Example 1, such retroactive distribution information management is impossible.
Further, in Comparative Example 2, it is possible to query production data as in Example 1. However, in order to print information data immediately before the packaging operation or simultaneously with the packaging operation, not at the time of manufacturing the cardboard case, Capital investment is required and the cost is increased. Further, the number of processes during packaging is increased, and the work efficiency is lowered. Further, there is a high possibility that the correspondence between the cardboard case and the article to be packaged is erroneously registered in the database.

Claims (5)

A database in which an information code is printed on a packaging container, a process of packaging an article in the packaging container manufactured as described above, and information on the article and the information code when the packaging container is continuously manufactured. A distribution information management system for goods. 2. The article distribution information management system according to claim 1, wherein the information code is a bar code. The article distribution information management system according to claim 1, wherein the printing method is an inkjet recording method. The distribution information management system for articles according to claim 3, wherein an active energy ray-curable ink is used. The distribution information management system for articles according to any one of claims 1 to 4, wherein the packaging container is a cardboard case.