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Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

cabinetmagazine.org

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Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#31

Post by dustin1114 »

I've worked in grocery logistics for several years, and can tell you from experience just how political CHEP, PECO, and iGPS pallet distribution can be. Because of the size of my organization's warehouses, CHEP especially requires stringent audits, and if a truck sent out with CHEP when it was not supposed to, the gestapo comes after you.

I will admit, though, that CHEP are the best when it comes to quality (other than iGPS, perhaps). They are far less likely to have splinter, warp, and degrade. They are also much more resilient to the abuse that the supply chain puts on them.

An important point to remember is automation. The logistics industry is becoming more and more automated. Consistent, high quality pallets are becoming a must. The typical hi-lo is becoming less and less common, while in its place are robotic automated guided vehicles, distribution conveyors, and high-bay storage and retrieval machines. I know from experience how much pain and frustration is caused by broken stringers, splinters, and warped whitewood (in our industry, we call them GMA pallets [Grocery Manufacturers Association]]. Literally days of lost time annually, which can equate to millions of dollars.

I have no real opinion about what the best direction is. You either fork out more up front for the good stuff (with all of its politics), or you just deal with the bad quality and inconsistencies of whitewood.

I have to say, this was a very interesting article...a nice change from Python 2.7 vs. 3.X!

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#32

Post by gumby »

dewey wrote: post #25

There's also an interesting system in Europe called EUR-pallet. [0] They are usually made out of higher quality wood and quite durable. The system works by trading pallets for pallets, so if you receive some goods on a EUR pallet the driver takes an empty EUR pallet from your stack and it'll be reused at the other company. [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EUR-pallet

EUR-pallet isn't the only alternative.

I'm fascinated that after all these years there isn't a standard pallet size. I have tried to design products that can "ship on a pallet" and end up shooting for a footprint one meter on a side which fits within a lot of format but leaves plenty of wasted space:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pallet#Dimensions

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#33

Post by phpnode »

kbaker wrote: post #24
phpnode wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lojack won't work for the reasons you mention, RFID really is the best solution because it's cheap and they don't need to change their existing inventory. There's no need for plastic pallets, they could embed the RFID tags into each of the wooden blocks which make up the corners of the pallet. If one doesn't already exist, it's probably quite simple to produce a nailgun like device which literally shoots an RFID tag…

The problem with RFID for pallets is that the logistics space is still too decentralized. I work for a company which does a lot of custom RFID integration (we have worked with the companies in the article for tracking pallets.) First, the RF properties of inserting RFID tags into wooden pallets just doesn't work well; it is far better to stick a label on the outside of the pallet. But then you get into durability iss…

thanks for the insight! regarding embedding the tags I was imagining a small device around the size of a large coin with perhaps three prongs / nails attached. The prongs would embed into the wood keeping the tag in place, and the force of installation would depress the device into the wood slightly, but the RFID tag itself would remain on the exterior of the wood, so it should still be readable.

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#34

Post by vacri »

The article is stacking the deck pretty heavily:

After all, collecting these stray pallets takes a lot of labor, a lot of miles, and a lot of trucks.

vs

they receive blue pallets whether they want them or not

So the recyclers' hands are tied because they receive pallets mixed in with white pallets when delivered by the truckload, but then they get to turn around and talk of all the effort collecting them. It's not hard - just educate your customers - "I won't pay for blue pallets, because they're rented equipment. You can ship them to me, but I'll reduce the payout for a truckload by the number of blues". What the article is promoting is that the recyclers get to play the innocent... then directly profit off it.

Don't get me wrong, I think the idea of renting pallets is stupid, but then again, I'm not making $3.5B/year. But the article seems to gloss over the fact that selling something you do not own is not legal, regardless of how much labour you put into it (otherwise burglary and fencing would be legal). These pallets are clearly marked; it's not like they're hard to confuse.

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#35

Post by vacri »

jessaustin wrote: post #19

Maybe this is a rare streak of jingoism for me, but it seems odd that a foreign company has been able to come in and dictate through the courts that the whole industry should work on a completely different model. Perhaps the reason "blue" is such a good deal for shippers is because much of the real cost has been transferred to third parties. ISTM the courts should force CHEP to include a significant deposit in its co…

A foreign company has been able to come in and dictate through the courts that the whole industry should work on a completely different model.

Welcome to the world outside the US.

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#36

Post by gig3m »

dustin1114 wrote: post #31

I've worked in grocery logistics for several years, and can tell you from experience just how political CHEP, PECO, and iGPS pallet distribution can be. Because of the size of my organization's warehouses, CHEP especially requires stringent audits, and if a truck sent out with CHEP when it was not supposed to, the gestapo comes after you. I will admit, though, that CHEP are the best when it comes to quality (other th…

Disclosure: I run one of the largest wooden pallet manufacturing companies in the United States. My family has been in this business for 50+ years.

Your perspective on whitewood comes from a 3rd tier perspective (grocery, as you say). In other words your various suppliers buy their pallets from various sources and then ship their product into you on those pallets. You and your (former?) employer are not directly involved in their procurement so you have little say in what you get, and I'm sure the quality varies widely.

That being said whitewood pallets (or just wooden as we would say) are actually a very cost effective and reliable way to ship product in the US, much more so than plastic. There are many quality manufacturers around the entire nation that provide great product and service, much better than your experience seems to suggest. Plastic is expensive to buy, more expensive to lose, and has various other problems and concerns.

To compare a built CHEP pallet with a "whitewood" pallet is a bit misleading however in several directions, especially to come to the conclusion that they are the "good stuff". They are the good stuff in terms of build quality because (by my estimation) they are built roughly 3x as strong as a generic 48x40 (standard GMA pallet.) They also cost upwards of 3x as much to manufacture and the process is no different than the bad quality pallets that you have had experience with. (Estimated GMA is about $10-11 per, CHEP block pallet would be above $30, depending on locale.) Of course they hold up better, they are built to do so. However, the pallet industry has gone from standardization on sizes in the last 20 years (GMA 48x40, Coke pallet 36x36 mentioned below) to being specifically engineered to the load it was made to carry.

TL;DR: There are wooden pallet manufacturers out there that produce a high quality product. CHEP and plastic are both expensive but have their own issues.

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#37

Post by gig3m »

jessaustin wrote: post #19

Maybe this is a rare streak of jingoism for me, but it seems odd that a foreign company has been able to come in and dictate through the courts that the whole industry should work on a completely different model. Perhaps the reason "blue" is such a good deal for shippers is because much of the real cost has been transferred to third parties. ISTM the courts should force CHEP to include a significant deposit in its co…

While CHEP definitely has changed the way some retail supply chains work, overall the pallet industry largely works the same as it did before CHEP was on the map. We build upwards of 2mil new manufacture wooden pallets per year and I never run into CHEP as an alternative for the sectors I service.

Source: I run one of the largest pallet manufacturers in the US, 50+ year old family business.

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#38

Post by [deleted] »

jessaustin wrote: post #19

Maybe this is a rare streak of jingoism for me, but it seems odd that a foreign company has been able to come in and dictate through the courts that the whole industry should work on a completely different model. Perhaps the reason "blue" is such a good deal for shippers is because much of the real cost has been transferred to third parties. ISTM the courts should force CHEP to include a significant deposit in its co…

[deleted]

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#39

Post by aurelian »

gig3m wrote: post #36
dustin1114 wrote: post #31

I've worked in grocery logistics for several years, and can tell you from experience just how political CHEP, PECO, and iGPS pallet distribution can be. Because of the size of my organization's warehouses, CHEP especially requires stringent audits, and if a truck sent out with CHEP when it was not supposed to, the gestapo comes after you. I will admit, though, that CHEP are the best when it comes to quality (other th…

Disclosure: I run one of the largest wooden pallet manufacturing companies in the United States. My family has been in this business for 50+ years. Your perspective on whitewood comes from a 3rd tier perspective (grocery, as you say). In other words your various suppliers buy their pallets from various sources and then ship their product into you on those pallets. You and your (former?) employer are not directly invo…

Aside from expense, what issues do plastic pallets have?

Re: Whitewood Under Siege: Wooden Shipping Pallets

#40

Post by mrerrormessage »

msandford wrote: post #5
GFischer wrote: post #2

A really compelling read. How many hidden industries like the pallets one are out there, waiting for software (or hardware) aid or disruption? I mean, 3.5 billion in pallet-related revenues :) , and millions in losses due to lack of tracking... is RFID really the best solution?

How much does a pallet cost to manufacture and how much does a lo-jack cost to implant? Further, how much does it cost to keep the lo-jack running for a decade? I used to run a 10,000 sqft logistics facility (really tiny in that world) and we kept a stock of about 20 pallets. I seem to remember the wooden ones costing $2-$5 used and the plastic ones less than $50 new. The most expensive pallets I could find from U-Li…

What if the pallets formed a mesh network? They would only need to have low-powered antennas (< 100m range) to network effectively with one another, and some kind of reader that talked to one could know all the other pallets that that one had "seen" and at what time. It would take a bit of work, and would be most practical for large pallet storage areas, but it could hugely cut costs, especially for wireless internet.
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