GB2188283A

GB2188283A - Prize-generating printed substrates

Info

Publication number: GB2188283A
Application number: GB08706832A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Adrian Anthony Elston
Original assignee: ADVERTISING AND MARKETING ASSO
Current assignee: ADVERTISING AND MARKETING ASSO
Priority date: 1986-03-21
Filing date: 1987-03-23
Publication date: 1987-09-30
Anticipated expiration: 2007-03-23
Also published as: GB8706832D0; GB2188283B

Abstract

Prize-generating substrates are described wherein the substrate (1) is printed with instructional and/or promotional information (2-4) and has at least one region (5) comprising a thermochromic material which changes colour with a change in temperature, for example, at skin temperature. A substrate bearing such thermochromic material may be one of an array of such substrates the remainder of which bear a material visibly indistinguishable from the thermochromic material at ambient temperature. The substrate may be of paper, card, board, plastics or foil in the form of a card, coupon, label, wrapper or part of a publication. <IMAGE>

Description

SPECIFICATION Improvements in or relating to prize-generating printed substrates This invention relates to a prize-generating substrates.

Prize-generating printed substrates of many types are known, ranging from simple raffleticketsto so-called "scratch cards". With raffle tickets, a ticket bearing a numberorotherindicia is drawn at random from a batch of tickets and generates a prize for the holder of a ticket corresponding to the drawn ticket. Scratch cards are cards which have one or more regions overprinted with an opaque latex ink which, when dry, can be scratched offthe card buy a holder of the card to reveal underneath the latex ink either nothing orindicia indicating whether or not a prize has been won by the holder of the card or whether or nota chance to participatefurtherin attempting to win a prize has been won.

Such scratch cards overprinted with latex ink suffer from several disadvantages. Firstly, the cards can become scratched in distributing them so that any wording underlying the latex ink may become visible, thus providing an unfairadvantageto people who may be presented with a choice of card.

Secondly, the underlying indicia may be defaced or rendered illegible when scratching off the latex ink and thirdly, the flakes of latex or scratchings arising when the cards are scratched can beunsighyand may have to be swept up.

It is an object ofthe invention to provide a different prize-generating printed substrate in which some or all ofthese disadvantages are overcome or reduced.

According to one aspect of the present invention there is provided a prize-generating printed substrate, wherein the substrate is printed with instructional and/or promotional indicia, and wherein at least one region of the substrate is printed with a thermochromic material which changes colourwith a change in temperature.

It is to be appreciated that in any promotional exercise or game in which such prize-generating printed substrates are employed, the majority of the substrates, e.g. cards, will not actually result in the generation of a prize because the thermochromic material will be absent and replaced by an inert material which does not change colour with a change in temperature but which at ambient temperature appears identical with and is indistinguishable from thethermochromic material.

Notwithstanding th at the majority of substrates will not result in the winning of a prize, such substrates are, for the purposes of th is specification, included within the term "prize-generating printed substrates".

Accordingly, another aspect ofthe present invention provides an array of prize-generating printed substrates as just defined, wherein all of the substrates are printed with identical visible instructional and/orpromotional material, and wherein at least one region of some of the substrates is printed with a thermochromic material which changes colourwith a change in temperature and the same region or regions of the remaining substrates is or are printed with a non-thermochromic material which, at ambienttemperature, is substantially visibly indistinguishable from thethermochromic material.

When the prize-generating substrates ofthe array are distributed to the users,there will be a random distribution of substrates bearing the thermochromic material and thus a random distribution of the changes of obtaining a prize.

The substrate ofthe present invention may be made of paper, card, cardboard, board, plastics film or even of metal foil, orof laminations oftwo or more of such materials, provided that it is capable of accepting and retaining the printing of instructional or instructional and promotional matter applied in theform of printing ink or otherwise, and provided that it is capable of accepting and retaining the thermochromic material applied to it.

The substrates may be in the form of cards, coupons, labels orwrappers, or in theform of leaflets, books, periodicals or newspapers on which the printing and thermochromic material are appropriately applied. If the substrates are in the form of cards, these may be open cards or closed cards with perforated edges which have to be torn off to reveal the thermochromic material inside. If the susbtrates are in the form of books or newspapers, thethermochromic material can be printed in such a way as to further a story as by way of clues, answers or instructions, particularly in childrens' stories or puzzle books, or in such a way as to aid a competition or lottery.

The thermochromic materials which may be used in making the prize-generating substrates ofthe present invention include a range ofthermochromic inks. These inks are conveniently in the form of thermochromic liquid crystal inks which are composed of microcapsules of liquid crystals in a clear aqueous resin binder. Typical thermochromic liquid crystals which reacttoachangein temperature by changing colour are described for example, in British Patent Specifications Nos.

1596012, 1596013and and 1596014. The microcapsules aretypicallyabout 10 micron in diameterand comprise a thin shell of cross-linked gelatine and the binder is typically an aqueous solution or emulsion of a polyvinyl acetate or acrylic polymer or copolymer.

A preferred range ofthermochromic inks are those which are sold undertheTrade Name "CHAMELEON" by the firm, Liquid Crystal Technology, while those sold underthe Trade Mark "COTHERM" by Coates Special Products Ltd., can also be used. These inks are based on liquid crystals that respond to variations in temperature by changing colour. The colour change is reversible and the inks can be formulated to change atvarious specified temperatures. The inks most likelyto prove popularfor use in the prize-generating cards ofthe present invention are those which change colour in response to bodytemperatures so that any colour change can be detected by contact of the printed area with the fingerof a user.However, thermochromic inks can beformulatedwhichchangecolourata whole range of temperatures from -20"C to +60"C, thus a winning card could respond to being placed against cold glass.

The thermochromic material may be printed on the substrates in a variety of ways. Thus it may be printed in the form of simple shapes, such as a circle oran ellipse offingerprintsize, or it may be printed in the form of a word or symbol which is surrounded by visibly indistinguishable non-thermochromic material. Thus, it may be printed in the form ofthe word "WIN", an indication of a sum of money, e.g. 5 or $1 0, orintheform of a symbol, such asan automboile. It may also be printed in the form of further instructions.

Thethermochromic inks are usually appliedto the substrate by a screen printing process onto a black background, the black background being necessary to absorb the colours that are not reflected bythe liquid crystal material and to provide contrast.

However, with suitable adaptation they can be used forflexographic printing into bottle labels, cartons and the like.

Thus in the case where the thermochromic ink is printed in the form oftheword UWIN u, the word will be surrounded bythe ink of the black background and at ambienttemperaturethiswill bevisibly indistinguishable from thethermochromic material.

Only when the region is heated will the word "WIN" becomevisible dueto the change in colourofthe thermochromic material.

In order to enable the invention to be more readily understood, reference will now be made to the accompanying drawings which illustrate diagrammatically and byway of examplesome examples thereof, and in which: Figure lisa perspective view of a prize-generating card, Figure2 is a perspective view of another prize-generating card, Figure 3 is a plan view of a prize-winning coupon as might be printed in a periodical or newspaper, and Figure4isa planviewofprize-winning card or coupon.

Referring now to Figure 1 ofthe drawings, there is shown a prize-generating card which comprises a substrate 1 which may be of paper, card, plastics material or of paper or card coated or impregnated with a plastics material. The nature ofthe substrate is, in fact, immaterial provided that it is capable of accepting a conventional printing medium as weil as thermochromic material. The substrate is shown as being for promotion of a bitter beer and is printed with appropriate promotional wording 2, as well as with instructions 3 and rules 4.

Prominently printed on the substrate is region 5 which may or may not contain or comprise a thermochromic material. Ifthe region 5 comprises the thermochromic material, then contact ofthe region 5 bythe thumb orfingerof a user in accordance with the instructions 3 will cause a colour change and reference to the rules 4 will tell the user how he or she may claim a prize. If the region5 does not comprise the thermochromic material, then,afterfollowing the instructions and obtaining no result, the card may bethrown away.

The card shown in the drawing is, of course, one of a promotional array of such cards which will be distributed at appropriate establishments over a given area. Some of the cards will be prize-winning cards with thermochromic material but the majority will not. However, the regions 5 on all the cards are made so as to be visually indistinguishable from each other at ambient temperature whether or not they comprise thermochromic material.

As indicated above, the thermochromic material is a thermochromic screen ink sold under the Trade Name "CHAMELEON" which is formulated to change colour at skin temperature.

Referring now to Figure 2, there is shown another prize-generating card in which a substrate card 6 is foldedf in half and secured by adhesive at its edges or which comprises two substrate cards secured at their edges by adhesive. Three sides of the card are perforated as at 7 and the edges of the card can be torn off, as shown, and the card opened to reveal, inside, a region of thermochromic material and instructions similar two those shown in Figure 1.

Referring now to Figure 3, there is shown a prize-winning coupon 8which might be printed in a periodical or newspaper or could be printed on a card. The coupon has a number of regions 9, one of which comprises thermochromic material and the others of which comprise material visibly indistinguishable from the thermochromic material.

Alternatively, the regions 9, or one of them, could reveal a number or symbol printed elsewhere to see if a prize had been won. The thermochromic material can be activated by gently rubbing with a finger or even by contact with a finger, when the warmth generated will cause a change in colour of the thermochromic material.

Figure 4shows a further prize-winning card or substrate 10 in which a region 11 has been activated by warmth to reveal the legend "WIN 1" printed in thermochromic material 12 and surrounded by non-thermochromic material 13 which is visibly indistinguishable from thethermochromic material 12 at ambient temperature.

Claims

1. A prize-generating printed substrate, comprising a substrate, printing on said substrate and giving instructional and/or promotional information, and at least one region of a thermochromic material which changes colour with a change in temperature provided on said substrate.

2. The substrate of Claim 1,whereinsaid substrate is a material capable of accepting printing and is selected from the group consisting of paper, card, board, cardboard, plastics film, metal foil, and laminations oftwo or more thereof.

3. The substrate of Claim 1, wherein the thermochromic material is a thermochromic liquid crystal ink.

4. An array of prize-generating printed substrates, comprising a plurality of discrete individual substrates, printing on each of said substrates giving substantially identical visible instructional and/or promotional information, a thermochromic material which changes colourwith a change in temperature provided on at least one region on at least one of said substrates, and a material which at ambienttemperature is visibly indistinguishable from said thermochromic material provided on the same region or regions ofthe remaining substrates.

5. The array of Claim 4, wherein said substrates are in the form of cards, coupons, labels, wrappers or leaflets.

6. The array of Claim 4, wherein the thermochromic material is a thermochromic liquid crystal ink.

7. The array of Claim 4, wherein said at least one region on at least one substrate comprises said thermochromicmaterial applied in a manner such as to convey information on a change in temperature.

8. The array of Claim 7, wherein the thermochromic material in said at least one region is surrounded by material which atambient temperature is visibly indistinguishable therefrom.

9. The array of Claim 4, wherein the thermochromic material is a thermochromic liquid crystal inkwhich changes colour at skin temperature.