Appeal No. 2002-1865
Application 09/452,678
appears to be known that a single discount may be given to a
customer purchasing a specified combination of plural items. The
discussion goes on in the paragraph bridging pages 1 and 2 that
these multiple item promotions give the customer "a choice of
items which he or she may purchase and receive a benefit." The
discussion continues by indicating that it was known in the art
to provide multiple item promotions involving items to be
purchased that were promoted by different entities. The
recitation of the customers receiving "a benefit" in the claims
on appeal does not exclude the possibility that the benefit
received by the customer may be more than one benefit from the
same manufacturer or sponsor rather than an apparent intended
context that a single benefit would be received by a customer
from plural different manufacturers, which the admitted prior art
appears to indicate anyway was known in the art. The claims
clearly do not require that only a single benefit be received by
the purchaser anyway.
All of these considerations are pertinent to the arguments
presented by appellants beginning at page 7 of the principal
brief on appeal and repeated somewhat in the reply brief. The
claims do not require different sponsors. Nor do the claims
require a single benefit received from plural sponsors. The
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