The present invention relates to a blank, which is provided with suitable rib or folding seams and cuts forming longitudinal panels and closing or lid elements on the head ends for folding a packaging into a special body for the benefit of sending mainly posters, calendars, drawings and such, called box for parcels, in which the box for parcels is mostly an elongated prismatic body, in which the dimensions of the cross-section and, thus those of the ground plane and the length/height relation of mentioned box for parcels are dependant on the to be packed and/or mailed posters, calendars, drawings and such.

Blanks for folding all kinds of containers for fruit and objects are known in many different shapes. For sending by post broadsheets for folding boxes are known for parcel-post, which have a rectangular parallellepiped shape. For mailing calendars, posters and such the familiar cardboard tubes with a cylindral cross-section are known. Especially these last tubes cause problems in handling for the postal service, because the franking and the address codes cannot be read automatically in the machines due to rolling away. For this purpose, the postal service attaches the tube with an elastic band on top of a square block with the address and such faced upward, so that it can be read by the machine. This increases the costs for the postal service, which must be paid in extra postage charges. Besides, storage of tubes is rather voluminous which causes problems for the sales outlets like office supply stores, postal agencies and such. Shortly, during use the known existing way of packing calendars, posters and such have a number of disadvantages.

Further, from research of the patent literature four somewhat similar patent documents are known, being:

• French Patent FR-A-2781 211. This Patent concerns a foldable package to which in short is referred. This patent is the closest prior art to the subject matter of claim 1.
• Dutch patent nr. NL 7306 638, submitted 11-05-1973 by the Corrugated board factory Z. de Zeeuw N.V., Eerbeek, Holland, which concerns a foldable packing in the form of a tube with a polygonal cross-section, meant for mailing all kinds of documents that can be rolled up, such as drawings, cards, calendars and such, in which the means for closing the ends of the packing for each end are formed by a first lid, which forms a whole with the end of one of the panels or longitudinal panels which can be folded and which is flanked by two flaps at two of its free edges, and a second lid, which forms one whole with the end of the other panel and can also be folded and is provided with a flap at at least one of its free edges. The disadvantage of this embodiment is that the mentioned lids with flaps can touch the contents of the carton tube and can and will damage, for example, the posters and calendars, through which in practice, the usefulness of this solution is less suitable.
• French patent document nr. 2703 335 submitted 01-04-1993 from submitter Société Continentale du Carton ondulé Socar, France by inventor DEHARBE, Gérard. Here, it concerns a packing of a material that is semi-flexurally stiff for packing fluorescent lighting tubes. Here, it concerns an oblong parcel box with a quadrangular cross-section, in which at the middle panel lids for closing are formed provided with flaps, which by opening can be slid inside in two panels to close the box. The lighting tube is stuck with its two connection pins on the ends in a plastic plate with quadrangular cross-section so that these are centred in the packing box, in which the lighting tube stays relatively far away from the inside of the packing and the sticking inside of the flaps no longer plays a role nor can damage the lighting tube. So, also this packing is not suitable for packing posters and calendars, because these are not centered in a much too large cross-section of the box for parcels.
• German Gebrauchsmuster DE 29815 106 UI, submitted 22-08-1998 by submitter/inventor SCHWAB, 90610 Winkelhaid, Germany. Here it also concerns a box for parcels with a quadrangular cross-section with end lids with flaps which enter through grooves in the parcel box, through which again damage can occur to the packed posters or calendars etc. if they are used for this, therefore this solution is also not suitable for perfectly sending posters and such.

The aim of the present invention is to provide such an improved prismatic holder or box for parcels, of which the above described disadvantages are eliminated and in which the total cost for production and mailing will be decreased.

For this a blank according to the preamble of claim 1 is characterized in that side panels are hingedly connected to both sides of each end panel adjacent the folding line connecting said end panel to the intermediate longitudinal panel, and further lips are hingedly connected to both sides of each side panel adjacent the folding line connecting said side panel to the corresponding end panel, and two further continuous grooves are formed along each longitudinal folding line, so that the end panels can be folded to close the ends of the packaging body and locked by folding the side panels against the packaging body and inserting the further lips into the further grooves, the material of the blank having sufficient bending strength, the blank being able to be repeatedly folded and unfolded along the folding lines, so that the packaging body can be used several times.

The advantage is that the aforementioned disadvantages are solved and that the improved box for parcels can be stored at the sales outlets, e.g. office supply stores, postal agencies and such, as a pile of flat blanks, through which storage space can be utilized more economically. Further, the most important advantage is that through folding the closing flaps the contents of the box for parcels cannot be touched. Furthermore, the improved box for parcels can, due to easy unfolding, be folded again in due course to be used again, etcetera.

Further, the blank according to the invention is developed in such a way that the mentioned ground plane or cross-section of the prismatic holder or box for parcels is preferably square, in which the preferred dimensions for L1 are approximately 325, 525, 725 and 925 mm and for L2 approximately 90 to 100 mm, in which the mentioned lengths L1 and L2 are obviously adjustable to possible other usages.

The advantage is that almost every rolled up element can be sent by post in a very economical way and can be reused repeatedly, in which the handling at sorting machines does not require extra work, as with round tubes. With this, reading of the so called bar codes can be done without problems.

Furthermore, the blank according to the invention is further creatively developed in such a way that on the first longitudinal panel of the mentioned blank two lips are connected by means of rib or folding seams and on the other opposite side plane or longitudinal panel two recesses are applied in order not to impede when folding the blank into a prismatic holder when putting the concerned lips in the matching grooves, in which all mentioned formed lips are cut slantwise at the ends and with the blank near the rib or folding seam form a kind of hook element for closing.

The advantages are a flexible and very professional blank foldable into a box for parcels, which at the postal handling provides much advantages and thus is advantageous to the client as well as the postal service.

The preferred construction of the invention will be described by way of example, and with reference to the accompanying drawing.

In which:

Fig. 1

shows a complete professional elaborated top view of a blank to fold into a prismatic holder or box for parcels according to a preferred embodiment of the invention; and

Fig. 2

a side view in oblique projection of the folded box for parcels of figure 1.

Figure 1 shows the blank 1 in top view to fold the prismatic holder or box for parcels according to a preferred embodiment of the invention. The cut off edges or limitations are indicated with continuous lines and the folding seams are indicated with dotted lines. Due to the folding seams 2, 3, 4, 5 the concerned blank is foldable into a prismatic tube or box for parcels 6 (figure 2) with a rectangular or quadrangular cross-section. The number of elongated side planes or longitudinal panels 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 is one more than which is needed for a quadrangular cross-section. This is done in order to bring the lips 12, 13 into suitable grooves 14, 15. In order to bring about a good anchoring, onto the lips 12, 13 and 16 up to 23 hook-shaped elements 24 have been applied, in which the mentioned lips fall in a folded state into the grooves 33 up to 40, as indicated in figure 2. The head ends of the improved box for parcels 6 are formed by the planes 25 and 26, which again have side planes 27, 28, 29 and 30 for a good quadrangular tube-shape. Further, in order to form a good box for parcels 6, wherein recesses 31 and 32 have been applied so the lips don't touch the contents of the box.

Figure 2 shows the blank 1 of figure 1 folded in into the improved box for parcels 6 according to a preferred embodiment of the invention, in which the same parts have the same indication numbers, in which the box for parcels 6 is shown in oblique projection. Further, again grooves 33 up to 40 have been applied for lips 16 up to 23.

Finally it has to be emphasized, that the above description constitutes a preferred embodiment, but that further variations and modifications are still possible without departing the scope of the appended claims.