Cardboard Pallets demystified

In 2016, ten years into my journey introducing Xanita corrugated fibreboard panels to designers and manufacturers in the ANZ region, I started digging deeper into the world of "paper" pallets, also called "kraft" or "cardboard" pallets. An increasing number of Asian & European exporters were switching from pine and hardwood timber pallets, over to lightweight "cardboard"-based pallets to reduce costs, CO2 transport-emissions and/or to satisfy buyers wanting zero pallet disposal issues after container destuffing.

Here's what I've learnt in the last 6 years.

Cardboard pallets are made from many combinations of corrugated and compressed fibreboard. Most are used for one-way transport of lightweight goods. As far as I can see, most are never racked between unsupported beams. If a business is wanting to make the swap over to cardboard from plastic or timber pallets, they budget around $50 for wire decking to span racking beams. This ensures the pallets don't collapse. See wire decking picture below.

Forklift operators have to then ensure the lower feet or decking of their cardboard pallets doen't get "ripped" by sliding over this wire mesh decking.

IKEA perfected cardboard pallet racking and saved many millions in swapping over from timber. See: https://packagingrevolution.net/ikea-phases-out-wood-pallets/

Apart from needing to address racking concerns, the other elephant in the room for new buyers is moisture, or put simply, people asking "what if my loaded cardboard pallet is left outside in the rain?" The short answer is there are now multiple eco-friendly (biodegradable) paper coatings that render the top and bottom surface-liners of corrugated fibreboard and honeycomb panels highly water-resistant, yet still repulpable.

Remember though, in the highly unlikely even that a pallet is left in say a 6mm deep puddle of water, the water will migrate up the pallet feet or be absorbed through the centre "medium" of the lower decking board on some pallets. Water-soaked cardboard falls apart under load. So keep your pallets away from pools of water. It's that simple.

The team at Lifdek USA showed the practical outcome of spraying a cardboard pallet, or skid with water and sliding it along a rough concrete floor as many time-poor forklift drivers tend to do. Check out the video below.

So now you know one can rack paper pallets and one can let them get slightly wet, but not soaked.

So why bother with cardboard pallets? It's easier to keep using wood and plastic isn't it?

Trillions of Dollars worth of lightweight food, goods and materials are transported from manufacturers and wholesalers into delivery centres feeding thousands of grocers and retail stores every year. Think lightbulbs, eggs, potato chips, chocolates, sweets, broccolli, coffee, tea, mushrooms, bread, electrical goods, cushions, clothing, toys, injection-molded auto and marine parts and more.

Often, retail procurement officers will specify that these goods have to be delivered on 40kg colour-painted hardwood pallets that are commonly made in SE-Asia by industrial conglomerates. These hardwood pallets are hired by the suppliers and they pass through multiple businesses on route to retail stores being constantly hired and de-hired by pallet controllers. Thousands of these hire pallets are lost each year and have to be paid for, despite them being held somewhere in the "pallet pool."

Paper pallets would instead be shipped flat-packed to the source of packing, saving over 90% in transport CO2 emissions because timber pallets are shipped pre-erected. The pallets would pass through mesh-racked warehouses to the grocery store, where post-use, they'd be thrown into cardboard compactors with the rest of the cardboard cartons that are commonly recycled outside the back of grocery stores. That would introduce further CO2 emissions-savings with air-filled pallets not having to be collected.

If say heavy-weight, frozen meat or tinned foods had to be transported, then cardboard pallets would be constructed from much sturdier honeycomb board like Xanita. For lighter goods, cardboard pallets with corrugated cardboard decks would suffice.

The Covid pandemic upended supply chains and caused businsesses to hoard their hired hardwood and one-way pine pallets, to prevent the chances of shutting down operations due to despatch issues. The situation got so bad in some regions that the price of pine pallets has doubled in many instances, thus creating a price gap with cheaper cardboard pallets. Stories circulated of pallet nails from China being help up in shipping containers blockaded offshore.

So how can economical cardboard pallets be constructed?

The most common method is to glue saw-cut corrugated blocks (pallet feet) to the underside of honeycomb or corrugated fibreboard decks. Here's a photo of an upturned pallet prepped for shipping. Instead of a complete bottom deck, strips of compressed fibreboard have been used to create an i-beam effect to reduce flexing of the pallet. These pallets would seldom be exported fully-assembled to overseas pallet buyers as most of the container would be air, not board. Seafreight shipping costs are also double what they used to be in 2019.

Lifdek, a USA start-up founded by three friends, released a small format assembly machine at Pack Expo Las Vegas in 2016 that allowed two rotary die-cut blanks to be folded to make a box-style pallet. The challenge with that design was the addressable market was very small given the final assembled pallet was not strong enough for rough forklift drivers entering and exiting the pallet at an angle. Their machine though attracted huge interest from packing industry pro's at Pack Expo.

Lifdek then pivoted to a four-ribbed design that didn't require a machine to assemble. A simply plywood jig-assembly table with angled brackets allowed two storepersons to assembled the below-pictured pallet in <90 seconds. In mid 2022, these pallets sell for around AU$20 to the trade.

Following on from Lifdek's patent-protected design, it seemed obvious to most that shipping pallet decks flat-packed into packing warehouses, clearly generated cost and transport emission savings.

Allkraft Pty Ltd, a Queensland, Australia company, is in September 2022 busy introducing a pallet supply model where volume pallet buyers can purchase rotary die-cut top and bottom decks, along with loose supplied pallet feet. Allkraft cardboard pallets are pictured below. The blocks & strips are glued with PVA wood glue on-demand, cutting back hugely on the need for forklift drivers to be driving to and from the outside yard to bring in stacks of pre-assembled timber pallets.

Allkraft's corrugated fibreboard pallet feet are made from Xanita core and wholesale supplied in bulk on a pallet, enough to make up 170 export-sized pallets on demand.

Whilst there are now expensive robotic-driven plants to glue-assemble cardboard pallets for hub and spoke distribution, the next evolution in cardboard pallet manufacturing will likely come from affordable and smaller cobots glue-assembling pallet feet to digitally die-cut pallet decks of all sizes, all assembled on-site in large packing halls for around half the delivered price of pine pallets and around a third of the price of hardwood pallets.

Here are two examples of high volume cardboard pallet-manufacturing:-

The main blocker to paper pallet adoption appears to be time-poor warehouse managers often resistant to disruptive change, despite the huge OH&S benefits cardboard pallets deliver. (manually picking up and moving nail-filled hardwood pallets presents all kinds of injury risks)

In 2030, I'll revisit this topic to comment on cardboard pallet adoption by supply chains currently embracing pine pallets. Scarce timber supplies, reduced CO2 emissions targets and rising fuel costs may just force change faster than we all imagine.

To view many more cardboard pallet designs, search Google images here.

Follow the Allkraft pallet supply model on allkraft.com.au from mid September 2022.