This invention generically relates to a casing for containing food products. In detail, the invention relates to a casing for containing food products with application in the fruit and vegetable industry sector, in particular in the production chain of containers for the transport and sale of fruit and vegetable products.

More specifically, the invention relates to a new type of casing for containing food products which can preferably be used for articles such as cherries, strawberries etc.

Fruit and vegetables are very important for dietary purposes because of their organoleptic properties, which are more noticeable when said products are fresh.

The fruit and vegetable supply chain is made up of four main processes: the production phase; the raw material processing phase; storage of the goods and finally the transport.

In order to identify the phases of the supply chain which are potentially harmful for the health of the consumer and for the quality of the product, an analysis is made of the relative critical points; as it is easy to imagine, critical phases of the whole process are, in particular, the packaging and storage phases.

In fact, the use of packaging which is unsuitable for containing food products and which does not provide a control of the thermal and/or humidity conditions of the products is a cause of risk of possible harm to the health of the consumer.

There are currently no casings for containing food products, for example fruit and vegetable products, which have a closure system which preserves the inviolability of the product, which acts as a quality control and/or anti shoplifting and therefore as a guarantee of safety.

In addition, besides the safety factor and quality of the product, it is important to underline how the choice of a well-designed container contributes towards making the product more recognisable on the market, improving its image and consequently facilitating its consumption. The container chosen will therefore guarantee a good image and good conservation of the products, prolonging the so-called “shelf life” of the product.

The packaging must therefore possess specific characteristics for certain categories of fruit and vegetables, depending also on the type of packaging or application.

This concept is even more valid when it comes to fruit defined as delicate, for which consumer expectations are much higher.

In the specific case, for small fruits, such as, for example, cherries, strawberries, etc.

The problems related to the storage step are mainly in the fact that the fruit, once collected, is put inside the same container in direct contact with each other causing as a consequence a faster decomposition process.

The containers used often do not completely protect the fruit, not only from the point of view of the freshness of the product, but also for possible external contamination, such as a possible attack by insects or pathogens. Moreover, another of the drawbacks of the prior art solutions to contain food products is that they are not totally recyclable or that excessive amounts of so-called single-use plastic are used to contain them.

The aim of the invention is, therefore, to overcome the above-mentioned drawbacks and, in particular, to make a casing for containing food products which overcomes the above-mentioned drawbacks and which is of a sustainable type, guaranteeing the inviolability of the packaging and keeping the product totally visible outside of it.

A further aim of the invention is to make a casing for containing food products which is not subject to a deterioration in the performance or conditions of storage of the products contained therein, compared to prior art solutions.

Another aim of the invention is to make a casing for containing food products which enables direct contact between food products, for example cherries, to be avoided, thereby avoiding the problem of early decomposition of the products.

A further aim of the invention is to make a casing for containing food products which slows down the metabolism of the fruit, reducing the proliferation of moulds and bacteria.

Another aim of the invention is to make a casing for containing food products which also facilitates the processes of carrying and transporting the food products whilst ensuring a good presentation of the food products.

A further aim of the invention is to make a casing for containing food products which is more rigid at a structural level than traditional systems and which gives the possibility to print, on the external walls of the casing, for example the reference brand.

A further aim of the invention is to make a casing for containing food products which is made from cheap and readily available raw materials. These and other aims, which are described in more detail below, are achieved by a casing for containing food products, in particular a container for fruit, preferably cherries, according to appended claim 1 ; other detailed technical characteristics of the casing for containing food products according to the invention are disclosed in the following dependent claims. Advantageously, according to the invention, the casing for containing food products allows, through a system inserted in the casing itself, defined as a “honeycomb" system, which acts as a separator between the individual fruits, direct contact to be avoided between them, thereby guaranteeing robustness, inviolability and sustainability of the container.

In addition, advantageously, a casing is provided which guarantees a good presentation of the products contained therein.

Advantageously, a casing for containing food products is provided which guarantees the inviolability of the package and thus acts as an anti shoplifting system.

Further aims and advantages of the invention will become clear from the following description, referring to a preferred but not limiting embodiment of the casing for containing food products, in particular for fruit and vegetable products, which is the object of the invention, and from the accompanying drawings, also provided purely as a preferred, non-limiting example, wherein:

- Figure 1 shows a cut blank of the casing for containing food products, according to the invention;

- Figure 2 shows a side perspective view of the casing for containing food products folded in its shape of final use according to the invention;

- Figure 3 shows a top view of the casing for containing food products of Figure 2;

- Figures 4a show a front view, with a detail of the anti-shoplifting closure, of the casing for containing food products of Figure 2;

- Figure 4b shows a perspective view and detail of the anti-shoplifting closure of Figure 4a;

- Figures 5a and 5b show a perspective view with detail at the step of opening the casing for containing food products, of Figure 2, according to the invention;

- Figures 6a and 6b show two side views of respective elements designed to make the honeycomb structure present inside the casing for containing food products, according to the invention.

It should be immediately noted that, even if the attached drawings refer to a particular type of casing for containing food products, in particular for fruit and vegetable products, the innovative concept described in the invention can be easily extended to any other type of container in general.

With particular reference to Figure 1 , the casing for containing food products according to the invention is denoted with reference numeral 1 .

Preferably, the casing 1 is made of paper/cardboard and/or, at least partially, polyactic acid (PLA) and is advantageously made of totally recyclable elements; this is advantageous once the casing has to be disposed of, as it can be fully recycled in terms of the paper/cardboard fraction, without any intermediate operation for mechanical separation between the components to be recycled and components constituting other types of waste.

In particular, the casing 1 is preferably box-shaped and parallelepiped, comprising a lid 40 and a base 41 of equivalent shape and size.

The lid 40 has foldable flaps 20 on three of its contiguous sides.

The lid 40 and the base 41 , when in an unfolded position, preferably lie on the same plane D and, subsequently, during folding, both are folded, by an angle perpendicular with respect to said plane D, in a specular manner along the axis X, for their joining.

In particular, the base 41 has first lateral foldable flaps 2 and a second foldable flap 3 which, once the device is closed, act as a pocket for said foldable flaps 20.

Advantageously, a feature of the second foldable flap 3 is that it has, preferably in its central part, a safety closure 6, preferably triangular in shape, having along its sides 9 perforations which act as guides for the opening of the safety closure 6 according to a direction L, as clearly shown in Figures 4a and 4b.

Furthermore, the safety closure has, preferably along one of its sides, a foldable flap 80, as visible in figures 5a and 5b, which in the construction step of the box will be inserted, according to the direction Y, inside a pocket 8 formed in the lid 40.

Advantageously, the safety closure 6, due to its shape and structure, acts as an anti-shoplifting system, that is, a quality control system of the casing 1.

Preferably, during the filling step, the box will be opened through the above- described foldable flap 80 which forms, thanks to parallel cuts 90 present laterally to the flap 80, an opening tab when extracted, according to the direction Y, visible for example in Figure 4b, from the pocket 8 of the lid 40. After the filling step, the box will be closed through an inverse process to that described above, making the inside of the box inviolable and not accessible thanks to the interlocking of the foldable flap 80 in the pocket 8. In particular, the end user will open the casing according to the direction L detaching the joining points between the perforations which act as a guide, in this way guaranteeing to the end user that the product has not been previously violated, thus acting as an anti-shoplifting and / or quality control device.

With particular reference to Figures 2 and 3, the lid 40 comprises a window 4 preferably made of a transparent material and even more preferably made of a polymeric material, which allows a visual inspection of the casing 1 itself.

Finally, a honeycomb-shaped device comprising elements 5 of longitudinal shape with the possibility of comprising different lengths and widths, varying relatively to the size of the casing 1 , is inserted inside the casing 1 . The elongated elements 5, thanks to a series of partial cuts 50, allow the above- mentioned honeycomb structure for containing food products to be made in a modular and therefore variable manner.

The characteristics of the casing for containing food products, according to the invention, clearly emerge from the description, as do the advantages thereof.

In particular, these advantages are represented by:

- total eco-sustainability and total recyclability of the components of the casing;

- guaranteeing the quality of the food product contained;

- preventing food products from coming into contact with each other;

- decreasing waste of fold products;

- using economical and high quality raw materials for construction of the casing;

- possibility of printing the logo on the sides of the casing;

- possibility of facilitating processes such as transport and sale of the product with relative safety guarantees;

- possibility of guaranteeing good presentation of the product to the buyer.

Lastly, it is clear that numerous other variants might be made to the casing for containing food products in question, without forsaking the principles of novelty of the inventive idea according to the accompanying claims, whilst it is also clear that in the practical actuation of the invention, the materials, the shapes and the dimensions of the illustrated details can be of any type according to requirements, and can be replaced by other equivalent elements.