Amos Pinky, as some Pallet Forum/Board veterans may recall,was a phantom Pallet Board huckster who hyped a ridiculous product that he was allegedly manufacturing, in Fresno California, no less. That product was an inflatable pallet trademarked as Inflatipal. Its claim to fame was being really light, and when deflated for empty shipment, really flat, so thousands could fit on a truck. Amos was just hot air, of course, but the idea of a very light pallet still has some bounce to it all these years later.
This is in light of ever-escalating freight costs and increasing warehouse fill rates, so my question is whether or not these factors are impacting pallet selection.
Here’s how the basics work when it comes to pallet weight and truck packing. You can weigh out a truckload to its maximum allowable load weight, or if you have light product that will never reach maximum allowable weight, then you can cube it out – filling the trailer. To reiterate, the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) defines cubing out as, “The act of reaching the capacity of product that can be shipped in a truck or other transportation vehicle.” FMI defines weighing out as, “The act of reaching the limit on the amount of product that can be shipped in a truck because of weight.”
Of course, competing for that space and that weight on the trailer are the pallets under the product. To the extent that the pallets weigh less or don’t take as much space (as in lower height), then less pallet can mean more load, and cheaper shipping cost per unit. The pallet, of course, creates a stream of benefits both before and after transport, that should also be considered.
Certainly for overseas shipments where freight is very expensive, we see more avoidance of pallets to increase the amount of product shipped, but that trend was also influenced by the implementation of ISPM-15 and initial fears about possible border rejections related to wood packaging. Thus, it isn’t as easy as attributing that change in pallet practices to just one factor.
One lightweight pallet substitute in this sector is the Optiledge, originally developed by IKEA. Dealing with stiff unit loads like knocked down wooden furniture, shippers attach the polypropylene ledges to the bottom of the unit load in conjunction with a strapping system.
In the airfreight sector, light pallets have long been prized. If freight is billed at $2 or more per pound, there is some serious money to be saved by reducing pallet weight through lightweight plastic or paper pallets. The Airdex pallet (www.airdex.com) is one product targeting the airfreight application, constructed of expanded polystyrene foam with a high impact polystyrene outer skin, weighing in at 6 or more pounds.
Moving onto domestic transportation and road freight, nestable plastic pallets are commonplace for downstream delivery. Cube reduction through nesting is important, and the lightweight factor comes into play – but as much for ergonomics and an agent of cost reduction (less plastic = less cost) than as a weight reduction initiative.
Another option is a hybrid solution, such as the Inca Presswood Wooden Pallet offered by Litco Intl. (www.litco.com). It boasts a design that is 60% lighter than conventional, hardwood pallets and can be reused. Inca pallets can easily be returned thanks to its nestable design with a space saving ratio of 4-1.
On the inbound logistics side of the equation we’ve seen the hype in recent years about lower weight pallets and fuel savings. iGPS has taken this tact as being lighter than CHEP. Because iGPS pitches not only the weight, but the plastic material, a comparable price point to wood and RFID as well in its offering bundle, it is difficult to know how important that weight reduction really is in shaping buyer behavior.
In my search for a more definitive answer, one idea I had was to call some forklift attachment salesmen. My thinking was that if freight rates are making people look for alternatives, they will be looking at options such as clamping unit loads onto the trailer floor, or utilizing push/pull equipment in conjunction with slip sheets.
“Interesting thought,” one attachment salesman commented to me, “but that’s not what we are really noticing.” What he is seeing is that companies are increasingly purchasing carton clamps for clamping off of layers of cartons to save on physical labor in the order selection process or piling process. He sees the decision driver as labor reduction rather than the freight cost angle I was chasing.
Not a quitter, I then called a corrugated pallet company, Corrupal (www.corrupal.com). At their website they list a number of positive attributes associated with paper pallets, including being ISPM-15 compliant, easily recyclable, safe for workers, easily customized, and light weight to allow freight savings.
I chatted briefly with Laurie Du Temple Quirion of Corrupal, and asked her how important the lightweight issue has been to their business. She remarked that it has been and remains an important consideration, but the dynamic of being lightweight hasn’t really changed the market situation more than in the past. She feels that the big change will be with the removal of the ISPM-15 exemption on Jan. 1, 2012, and she is preparing to help customers with that transition. In other words, she feels that it is the bug issue rather than freight cost that will drive change for their lightweight product line.
Changing gears to look at the cube issue, I do note that there are a couple of newer products in the marketplace that are tackling this issue. One, for example, is the Lomold pallet out of Australia. It is a rackable plastic composite pallet (at 31 lbs also a contender in the lightweight category) that addresses the cube issue, at least for back haul, in that the bottom base is detachable and can be used as a slave. This leaves a nestable pallet that provides good cube efficiency for returning to trading partners.
Back in 2002, the Pallet Enterprise interviewed Dr. Mark White, packaging and pallet expert, about the potential windfall of savings that industry could enjoy if we could only shave an inch or two off of pallet height. At the time, Mark acknowledged that this would be a long-term project.
Because of supply chain complexity, it is hard in many applications to make a change to the pallet without changing the whole pallet system, and because it is so hard to change the pallet system, it is just plain difficult to make any change at all.
As always, look for specific applications in less complex supply chains, or in segments of complex supply chains that can be isolated, to be the early adopters towards future trends. Amos Pinky is watching, biding his time for the return of the Inflatipal.
