Low cost laminatable plastic envelope for easy customized self-lamination of greeting cards, memorabilia, and like displays

Memorabilia insert sheets are pressed against a support sheet having rows and columns of small area self-stick visual fiducial adhesive zones imprinted thereon. Since the adhesive in the zones is releasable and reusable, misaligned insert sheets may be readily mounted upon the support sheet a number of times by an unskilled user until the insert sheet edges are parallel with respect to the support sheet edges and the surrounding borders are even. A transparent cover sheet is then laminated to the insert sheet by the application of heat and pressure to make a long-lasting, attractive display.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
The present invention relates to the field of laminated plastic display 
devices such as ID cards, sales presentation folders, memorabilia 
displays, greeting cards and the like. 
In our somewhat mechanized and impersonal society, people have a need for 
self-expression. For example, conventional greeting cards although 
mass-marketed, lack the personal touch for many. People buy substitute 
"liscense plate" posters mounted on the front of their cars for 
self-expression but the messages and designs are limited in number and, 
like greeting cards, are not really customized. The need for self 
expression is partially satisfied by collecting memorabilia such as 
photos, nostalgic invitations, matchbook covers, post cards, newspaper 
clippings, theater tickets and the like. Such memorabilia is usually 
stored in file folders, albums or other containers where they are not 
continuously viewed, and hence often forgotten. They are also often 
unprotected against dampness and can be marred during handling by the 
collector. 
Other types of memorabilia which are fun to produce, are PC generated 
imagery, customized with the aid of "desk-top" publishing programs. 
Examples are pictures of the family, pets, the family house and car and so 
forth. Such customized pictures may be comical by, for instance, putting 
eye-glasses on ones dog or cat. As in the case of the aforesaid 
memorabilia, it is desirable to continuously display and preserve this 
type of somewhat fragile computer output, which would be fun to laminate 
upon a customized greeting card, wall display or in the license plate 
format mentioned above. 
It is believed that this need for self-expression may be fulfilled by 
providing people with a method of self-laminating such memorabilia on the 
spot, without sending the material to a mail order laminating facility, to 
create customized visual displays for continuous viewing. Lamination of 
such material within a plastic envelope also preserves the memorabilia 
indefinitely and greatly improves the aesthetic appearance thereof. The 
desired do-it-yourself self-laminating process should be quick and easy to 
carry out on-the-spot, by any unskilled person. Optionally, it would be 
desirable to provide a method of lamination not requiring a conventional 
laminator at all, although a conventional laminator could produce a better 
lamination. 
Furthermore, even conventional laminating equipment, often results in the 
production of a laminated product having skewed, unaesthetically 
positioned or cockeyed insert sheets which in effect ruins the insert 
sheet memorabilia display. This is because the insert sheets are not 
initially aligned parallel with the edges of the plastic envelope, or even 
if initially aligned, become misaligned during handling just before 
insertion into the laminator. This problem is aggrevated when laminating 
more than one insert and/or laminating a two-sided display in a manner to 
be described. 
SUMMARY OF A PREFERRED EMBODIMENT OF THE INVENTION 
The aforesaid needs and objects of the present invention, being an integral 
part thereof, are met by providing a paper memorabilia support sheet 
having a light transmissive plastic cover sheet affixed thereto, the 
support sheet having rows and columns of imprinted adhesive zones made of 
readily releasable and reusable pressure sensitive self-stick adhesive. 
The aforesaid insert sheets of memorabilia are manually positioned upon 
the front surface of the support sheet and are held to the support sheet 
by the self-stick adhesive zones imprinted thereon. Preferrably, the 
adhesive zones are readily visible so that they act as visual fiducials 
and thus aid in aligning the insert sheets parallel with respect to the 
edges of the plastic envelope. 
Even when carefully positioning the inserts upon the paper support sheet, 
the user will often unintentionally position an insert sheet ina skewed 
unaesthetic manner. If one or more or the insert sheets are mounted skewed 
with respect to the envelope edges, the unskilled user may easily peel 
away the inserts from the support sheet and re-position them one or even 
several times until the edges of the inserts are parallel with the edges 
of the support sheet. This is because the self-stick adhesive is reusable 
and the areas occupied by these adhesive zones are small relative to the 
total non-stick area of the front surface of the support sheet, enabling 
the insert sheets to easily peeled away from the support sheet. The cover 
sheet has a heat or pressure sensitive adhesive surface for thereafter 
laminating the cover sheet to the support sheet, thus encapsulating the 
aligned inserts between the support sheet and the cover sheet. 
The self-stick adhesive zones may optionally be imprinted on the rear face 
of the support sheet in addition to its front face, and a second cover 
sheet, affixed to the support sheet, is used to laminate a second set of 
insert sheets to the rear of the support sheet, resulting in a two-sided 
display. Where heat lamination is employed, a special visual fiducial 
forming ink may be mixed with the self-stick adhesive of the adhesive 
zones, which ink disappears under the influence of the heat of lamination. 
Also, in the absence of the aforesaid self-stick adhesive zones, the 
inserts, even if initially positioned upon the support sheet in a 
non-skewed manner, can often shift and become skewed during handling, 
before lamination is completed. this undersirable shifting is even more 
likely for the two-sided laminated display or photo ID card having insert 
sheets on both sides of the support or core sheet.

SPECIFIC DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION 
In FIGS. 1 and 2, a greeting card 1 has a paper insert memorabilia support 
sheet 3 and a plastic cover sheet 5 having a cover sheet adhesive layer 9 
thereon facing the support sheet 3. The plastic cover sheet is preferrably 
made of poly-ethylene terephthalate, commonly used for plastic laminations 
and marketed under carious trademarks e.g. "Mylar", "Melanex", etc. 
Adhesive layer 9 could comprise heat activatable polyolefin if lamination 
is to be carried out by heat and pressure, or could be of the pressure 
sensitive variety. The cover sheet 5 with its heat seal 9 is affixed to an 
upper edge portion of support sheet 3 by a heat seal 7, or by a pressue 
sensitive adhesive. 
In accordance with the invention, rows and columns of self-stick adhesive 
zones 11, are imprinted upon the insert sheet support sheet 3 as shown in 
FIGS. 1 and 2. These adhesives zones comprise readily releasable, reusable 
pressure sensitive self-stick adhesive, widely in use in connection with 
self-stick remainder notes such as those marketed under the trademark 
"Post-it" note pads, and distributed by 3M Corporation. Adhesive zones 11 
are preferrably small dots, so that the total area occupied by the 
adhesive zones is small, that is two to twenty percent of the area of the 
face of the support sheet having the zones thereon. This provides 
substantial border areas 12 between the adhesive zones 11 to provide for 
good bonding of the cover sheet 5 to the support sheet in margins 
surrounding the inserts. 
In FIGS. 1 and 2, plastic cover sheet 5 overlays the right hand half 6 of 
sheet 3 of the card supplied to the user. An insert sheet 13 such as a 
family photo, sketch or other customized material is positioned by the 
user upon the support sheet 3 and is held thereon by the self-stick 
adhesive zones or dots 11 pre-printed upon the card at the factory. If the 
unskilled user is lucky, the edges of the photo 13 will be aligned with or 
parallel with respect to the edges of the support sheet 3 after being 
affixed thereto. If the photo is cockeyed or skewed with respect to the 
support sheet edges, the photo is readily lifted or peeled off of the 
support sheet by the fingers of the unskilled user, since most of the 
support sheet surface has no adhesive thereon. In other words, because the 
adhesive zones 11 are small, there will be substantial separations between 
the poorly mounted insert sheet and the support sheet surface, to make it 
easy to manually peel the photo insert sheet 13 off of the support sheet. 
However, even if alignment of the photo edges with respect to the insert 
sheet edges is attained on the first try, the borders surrounding the 
photo may have uneven widths, so that the photo should be peeled off of 
the support sheet and repositioned. Importantly, the adhesive bond is weak 
and thus readily releasable, permitting easy removal of the insert sheet 
or sheets. The adhesive in the zones is also reusable, enabling the 
unskilled user to make several tries for correct positioning and 
alignment. The home user or store clerk now passes the right-hand portion 
6 of the card through the laminator to create an attractive display of the 
photo or sketch, and the user can right a customized message on the 
left-hand portion 8 before mailing the now customized greeting card. 
The invention may be practised with adhesive zones having virtually no 
visible contrast with the support sheet, since the user can reference by 
"eyeballing" the insert sheet edges parallel with respect to the envelope 
edges. The user can repeatedly reposition the inserts as the adhesive is 
re-usable. However, it is preferrable to produce a visual contrast between 
the support sheet 3 and the adhesive zones 11 so that the rows and columns 
of adhesive zones, which are parallel to the envelope edges, act as 
visible fiducials closer to the inserts. Furthermore, the fiducials are 
preferrably small, so that the adhesive dot fiducials upon the support 
sheet surface portions surrounding the borders of the inserts will not be 
too visually pronounced, to produce a somewhat unaesthetic effect. The 
fiducials could be light pink or blue on a white support sheet surface to 
yield this result. 
In accordance with a further feature of the invention, a special ink can be 
mixed with the adhesive material of the adhesive zones which ink 
disappears upon the application of heat to the envelope during laminating 
step. Alternatively, the special ink may be printed within a central 
portion of the adhesive zones 11. For a description of the nature and 
composition of such ink, see U.S. Pat. No. 4,188,139 issued to Pasini. The 
optional use of this special ink can provide enhanced visual contrast 
between the adhesive zone dots and the support sheet surface, which can be 
particularly helpful in poor lighting conditins or in aid of people having 
limited eyesight. 
Another option is to use standard ultra violet ink and align the items 
under an ultra violet lamp, which is widely used in security applications. 
In such a case, the u.v. dots are a permanent part of the final laminated 
display. They are also invisible under normal ambient light but are a 
protection against tampering because the geometric pattern would be 
distorted and show up as irregular or missing dots under u.v. examination. 
However, in the interest of economy, the self-stick adhesive used in 
"Post-it" pads can be used without adding a contrast enhancing ink, since 
the limited visual contrast of the fiducials with respect tothe background 
may be sufficient for many users. 
Another possibility is to print the fiducials with a light blue or pink 
ink, and imprint the self-stick adhesive within a smaller central portion 
of the inked fiducials. This approach will not present any printing 
alignment problems. Also the printing of the preferred continuous 
"wall-paper" pattern of rows and columns of adhesive zone dot fiducials 
will not involve printing registration problems during the manufacture of 
the card supplied to the user, so long as the rows and columns of fiducial 
dots are parallel to the edges of the plastic envelope. 
In FIGS. 3 and 4, a dual-sided envelope is shown with several insert sheets 
of memorabilia mounted on the front and rear faces of the insert sheet 
support sheet 3 before lamination. The support sheet now becomes a core 
sheet since it will occupy the central portion of the laminated product. A 
second light transmissive laminatable cover plastic cover sheet 5' with 
its heat activatable layer 9' facing the rear face of the core sheet 3 is 
shown. A second heat seal 7' affixes the rear second cover sheet 5' to the 
core sheet upon manufacture. The front face of the core sheet 3 bears the 
"wallpaper" pattern of rows and columns of adhesive dot fiducials 11 as 
previously described. A second set of like fiducials 11' are printed on 
the rear surface of the core sheet 3. Thus a second set of inserts can be 
neatly mounted upon and laminated to the rear of the core sheet and the 
insert capacity of the visual display is thus doubled. 
An exemplary pictorial composition or montage of laminated inserts could, 
for example, include matchbook covers 16 and 18, photo 19 of a dating 
couple and insert sheet 23 could be a theater ticket, reminescent of a 
nostalgic event. Even a lock o hair 22 may be added to the laminated 
display. Thus, the product could have much versitility. People could bring 
their memorabilia to a shopping mall and the lamination could be produced 
by an unskilled store clerk. A second group of insert sheet memorabilia 20 
may be mounted on the rear face of the support sheet 3 by means of 
adhesive zones 11' before lamination to produce a double sided display of 
more memorabilia. The display could be suspended from the ceiling in the 
home in the manner of a mobile so that both sides may be viewed 
simultaneously. Alternatively, the double-sided display could be wall 
mounted to display one side and could be turned around from time to time 
to display the other side. This method is also useful for making photo ID 
cards having inserts on both sides of the core sheet 3. 
In the case of the greeting card of FIG. 1, an inexpensive heat and 
pressure laminator could be provided in the vicinity of the greeting card 
counter. Such laminators have been widely marketed by Avant Inc. of West 
Concord, Ma and produce more aesthetic laminations than those produced by 
pressure sensitive adhesives. In the latter case, a soft rubber squeege 
roller may produce an acceptable lamination by a pressure sensitive 
adhesive, covered by a conventional protective overlay sheet which is 
manually peeled away by the user before application of the squeege roller. 
We still prefer heat and pressure lamination by means of a conventional 
laminator, where the cover sheet is of a structured plastic of polyester 
and polyethylene, the structured plastic sheet having a thickness of 1.5-3 
mils. However, such lamination could be carried out by the user applying 
an ordinary kitchen iron to the plastic cover sheet at the cost of 
producing a product of somewhat lower quality. The embodiments of FIGS. 3 
and 4 may be laminated in like manner to produce the final laminated 
product. 
While preferred embodiments of the present invention have been described 
above, other embodiments will be apparent to those skilled in the art, and 
thus the scope of the present invention is to be limited solely by the 
terms of the following claims and art recognized equivalents thereof. The 
invention may also be used to make multiple insert ID cards, or virtually 
any other display product.