Uncrustably obvious?
Admittedly, I don't know much about patent law, though I do seem to remember I did pretty well in my intellectual property class back in law school. Anyway, this article seems to indicate that Smucker's isn't entitled to an extension of their patent for Uncrustables because their design is "obvious."
Really? How long have PB&J's been around? What's that? A really long time? That's what I thought. And yet it wasn't until the new millenium that someone marketed a premade PB&J in which both sides of the sandwich are coated with PB to protect the bread from the J.
And don't even get me started on the genius of cutting off the crusts and sealing the edges.
If it was so damn obvious, how come no one had ever done it before?
Seriously? Pampered Chef (among others, I imagine) has for years offered a tool that you can used in your own home to create such uncrustable sandwiches. And mothers everywhere have been cutting crust off of bread since bread had crust.