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Litco Pallets Used for Shipping Lincoln Electric Welding Equipment
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With a new presswood pallet, Lincoln Electric is meeting European export requirements, streamlining its pallet inventory, and getting a sustainability benefit to boot.

Inca presswood pallets are helping Lincoln Electric comply with export shipping requirements for pallets to be free of bark and insects. “In the past, our shipments to Europe were sometimes held up for inspection,” says Tom Soster, manufacturing engineering manager for Cleveland-based manufacturer of arc welding machines and consummables. “Now, the presswood pallets flow right through.”

As a side benefit, the pallets complement Lincoln Electric’s initiatives to stay lean and green: Since they are both nestable and Cradle to Cradle certified, they free up valuable dock space previously dedicated to pallet storage and can be recycled at the end of their life.

Lincoln began investigating alternative pallets as part of a cost reduction program in January 2009. At the time, the manufacturer was purchasing construction-grade pine and making export pallets in-house. “We were shipping nine different products and each had its own unique pallet design,” says Soster. In addition to maintaining an inventory of nine different sizes that took up valuable space on an apron in the dock area, the pallets had to be bark free and be made from heat-treated lumber to meet European regulations for pallets.

One of the responses to Lincoln’s inquiries was for the Inca pallet. Manufactured using an environmentally-responsible process that molds wood waste and wood byproducts under high heat and pressure, the pallets are ISPM 15 approved wood packaging and guaranteed free of bugs, bark and mold. They were also available in a half pallet size, measuring 24” by 40”, that was ideal for Lincoln’s welding machines. “We received some samples of the pallet and by February 2009, we had changed over our first product,” says Soster. “On our first shipment, we learned that presswood pallets are common and welcomed in Europe. It was a very easy transition.”

Since then, Lincoln has changed eight additional pallets over to the presswood pallet, delivering an estimated 5% savings on the cost of the pallets. More importantly, Lincoln can order the pallets on an as-needed, just-in-time basis from a local distributor. Since the pallet nests, they require less space for storage than the old pallets and fewer trips to move the same number of pallets from storage to the packaging area. “The ability to order based on what we need means we can run a leaner operation,” says Soster. “And, since they nest, we can bring 50 pallets at a time into the product area instead of 25. That means fewer trips to move pallets.”

As an additional benefit, the presswood pallets are recyclable and earned a silver Cradle to Cradle certification from MBDC, an organization that assesses the sustainability of a product and the practices employed in making it. “Like most responsible organizations, Lincoln Electric is concerned about sustainability,” says Soster. “Using a presswood pallet is not only meeting our shipping requirements, it’s making us a little more green.”

A PDF version of this article is available here.

Litco International Inc., based in Vienna, Ohio, is North America’s leading source of wooden presswood pallets. Made from pre- and post-consumer wood chips in a patented molding process, presswood pallets offer shippers a number of advantages over traditional wood pallets, including lower cost and lower weight. Litco also provides plastic pallets and a variety of other shipping products, including separator boards, core plugs, dunnage bags and void fill, as well as pallet management, leasing and other services. Litco was established in 1962 and ships worldwide from facilities in Ohio, South Carolina and Mississippi. Call 330-539-5433 for more information.