Pallet Bands & Bettering Results/Lowering Costs – Fastmile
The Challenge
With plastic wrap costs averaging $14,000 a year, Fastmile Logistics, a solutions company, looked to reduce their packaging material and disposal costs. Historically, as loose shipments of cabinets arrived at their storage facility, they wrapped the pallet load in plastic wrap. However, each time they needed to load an outgoing truck they had to unwrap and re-wrap the pallet loads due to the product mix. This was a time-consuming and costly task. Aero Rubber helped Fastmile find an alternative.
The Fix
After evaluation, Fastmile found rubber pallet bands not only cost effective but also a time saver. “We have been using the bands since 2014 and found that in plastic wrap product cost alone we are saving around $5,000 a year,” claims Brad Ward the general manager at the Orlando location.
Fastmile uses a pallet size larger than your typical pallet to hold the cabinets. “Using custom pallets for the cabinets, the size of the rubber bands was just as important because they had to fit with our custom pallet size.”
We use two bands one at the top and one at the bottom to keep the load stable and have found no problems with the bands stabilizing our loads,” Ward answered when asked about how well the bands have worked for them.
“They work so well, we use them at our other locations when those locations have had the same application.”
He noted the pallet band elasticity was instrumental to secure palletized loads.
The Benefits
Aero’s rubber pallet bands were not the only alternative Fastmile tried, but it was the most efficient. “We tried the polyurethane with metal clasps but the clasps were time consuming and if you over tightened them, it could lead to product damage,” Ward explained. The other obstacle was the size of the pallet. After seeing how tightening the metal clasps led to difficulties, he enjoyed the way the bands snap into place after being applied to the pallet. No extra steps were needed.
The bands do have a very specific use inside their warehouse and are not seen on every pallet. “Most of our pallets come in wrapped and leave with the same wrap on them which doesn’t give us the opportunity to use the bands,” Understanding the bands are not for every warehouse application, Ward would still recommend the bands to anyone looking to make changes where wrapping and re-wrapping take place.
The strategy to switch from plastic wrap to pallet bands, which are reusable, led to yearly savings of more than $5,000 while keeping or improving efficiencies because they no longer had to deal with the wrapping and unwrapping every time they needed to unload and re-load the cabinets. The bands fulfilled Fastmile’s objective of lowering the amount spent on plastic wrap and reducing their trash costs.