But there’s an easy way out of this. By letting BDS take care of your pallet storage you can save your business money and free-up internal resources.

Cost-effective pallet storage

Commitment free

With BDS you only pay for the number of pallet storage positions of goods for any given week. There’s no commitment. We pride ourselves on our flexibility and ability to tailor our service to our clients specifications, ensuring you get a personalised approach to storage.

Precise stock management

We have an exacting barcode-based stock management system in place to make sure you have a full and clear picture of your inventory. Plus we are happy to receive your goods either pre-palletised, or in loose cartons, whereby we will take care of palletisation.

A comprehensive solution

With warehouses located just one hour from Heathrow and 12 miles from Southampton Docks, we can offer a comprehensive fulfillment and distribution service alongside our pallet storage service. BDS has over 30 years experience providing reliable and personalised storage, distribution and fulfillment service to business of all sizes, so you can trust us to get the job done right.

If you have a great business idea you want to focus on making it work, which is why outsourcing complicated and time consuming process such as fulfillment can help small or medium sized enterprises grow and prosper.

Top reasons to outsource fulfillment

Growth

The growth of your business is linked to the number of your orders. For a small business, failing to cope with a dramatic spike in orders can be very damaging. By outsourcing fulfillment to professionals you can avoid this, manage your growth effectively and compete with bigger players in your space.

Resources

Perhaps the biggest benefit to outsourcing fulfillment is that it frees up resources inside your company and allows you to focus on growing your business and developing your client base. Fulfillment isn’t a straightforward process, and many SMEs have suffered its pitfalls, but with 30 years experience in this area BDS can spare you the pain.

Location, location, location

One of the most important aspects of fulfillment is ensuring the logistics are sound and your customers can get their goods on time. By outsourcing to BDS you gain the advantage of ours secure premises in the M3/M27 corridor over sites at Chichester, West Sussex and Eastleigh, Hampshire. We have storage centres 1 hour from Heathrow and Gatwick and 12 miles from Southampton Docks.

Want to find out more about how we can boost your business? Get in touch today by email or phone via our contacts page.

● Easy to use and setup.
● Fast to process the data.
● Integration with common software such as spreadsheets and word processors.
● Integration with email systems to allow regular notifications and user updatesy you when stocks are getting low.
● Product fields and description boxes that enable you to clearly see what you have in stock
● Pricing optionst.
● Ability to group products logically together.
● Easy integration with complimentary products such as accounting packages or website stock control.
● Ability to increase/decrease or otherwise manage pricing across the product set.
● Instant stock check or valuation of stock on hand.
● Help with managing part delivered supplies.

● Managed remotely.
● All backups and “back end” security managed remotely.
● Usability / adaptability .
● Can be accessed from anywhere there is an internet connection (home, office, airport…).
● Security must be consistently maintained

.

● You control the PC and software.
● You are responsible for backing up the system and technical maintenance.

Choosing a Courier

At BSD online we know that one of the most important aspects of any online business is how it handles its deliveries. Customers that regularly shop online consistently state that efficient delivery is one of the main reasons they return to an online retailer they have bought from before. First time users of  a website also rate highly factors including a sites ability to communicate fast and reliable delivery. Knowing that if you order a product,  you would have it in your hands within a definitive time scale is critical. It’s no accident that some of the most successful online businesses have fast and efficient fulfilment operations at the core of their business model.

The post office and Royal Mail services are most businesses first port of call when considering delivery options for their online order fulfilment. However, for many items these “one size fits all” services don’t fit all and so businesses need to search for and consider these alternative services from independent couriers.

In many instances couriers can be used alongside the normal delivery services provided by Royal Mail when you want to offer even faster delivery times for your customers. With the gradual reduction of Royal Mail’s monopoly on postal services and the opening up of this market to competition the choice of couriers for businesses is becoming more important.

It may be you want to offer a selection of delivery options to your customers and allow them to decide whether they want speedy delivery or are happy to choose less urgent options at lower cost. Some customers are prepared to pay a premium price to get their goods delivered in the shortest possible time, others are not in a hurry and would prefer to save money,  it therefore  makes commercial sense to offer a choice if this can be accomplished cost effectively and efficiently within your business.

You also need to consider the international market, as your online business has the potential of a global customer base you may find that demand dictates you also offer international shipping options to customers. In many respects national and international courier services are the same, but whilst one courier company may be very competitive for domestic services, they may not be competitive for international courier services. Using one courier for all shipments can be an efficient way of organising your order fulfilment, but it may not be the least cost route. Selecting a range of courier companies to deliver different items to different locations may allow savings but could also mean you miss out on volume discounts.

However most important for any courier selection process is the reliability of the courier. If the courier cannot deliver on time and in a consistent way the price offered is irrelevant. We have put together a list of considerations we use when making courier comparisons.

1. Speed of Delivery
2. The tracking system used by the courier
3. The customer service offered by the courier
4. The Size of the Goods Being Shipped
5. The Transport Infrastructure of the Destination Country
6. Special Delivery Requirements of our clients

We have put together the below information on pallet sizes and specs as a useful reference for all our customers whether frequent users of our pallet shipping service or just adhoc clients of our pallet delivery and pallet storage services.  For our quick Pallet Size Reference Guide, click here.

Pallet construction &  Types of Pallet

Pallets come in all manner of sizes and configurations, and for the first time user being asked whether their stock is on Standard or Euro pallets can be an unexpected hurdle, especially if the stock is not in the same location as they are.  All pallets fall into two very broad categories: “stringer” pallets and “block” pallets.

Stringer pallet

Stringer pallets use a frame of three parallel pieces of timber (called stringers). The top deckboards are then affixed to the stringers to create the pallet structure. Stringer pallets are also known as “two-way” pallets, since a pallet-truck may only lift it from two directions instead of four. Forklifts can lift a stringer pallet from all four directions, though lifting by the stringers is more secure.

Block pallet

Block pallets (also referred to as Manoj pallets) are typically stronger than stringer pallets. Block pallets utilize both parallel and perpendicular stringers to better facilitate efficient handling. A block pallet is also known as a “four-way” pallet, since a pallet-truck may be used from any side to move it.

Materials used to make pallets

The cheapest pallets are made of softwood are often considered expendable, to be discarded as trash along with other wrapping elements, at the end of the trip. These pallets are simple stringer pallets, and liftable from two sides. For obvious reasons these are most frequently used for all our fulfilment services and for most of our pallet storage requirements.

Pallets can also be made from hardwood, plastic, paper or cardboard, aluminum and even steel. The pallet construction specifications will depend on the pallet’s intended use: general, FDA, storage, chemical, export; the expected load weight; type of wood desired: recycled, hard, soft, kiln Dried or combo (new & recycle); and even the type of fasteners desired to hold the pallet together: staples or nails can all be specified depending on what ultimate use and destination the pallet and cargo have.

Paper pallets are often used for light loads, but engineered paper pallets are increasingly used for loads that compare with wood. Paper pallets are also used where recycling and easy disposal is important.

Plastic pallets are usually extremely durable, and resist weathering, rot, chemicals and corrosion as well as often being stackable . Plastic pallets are exempt by inspection for biosafety concerns where goods are crossing international borders, and are easily sanitized for international shipping.

Steel pallets are strong and are used for heavy loads, high-stacking loads, long term dry storage, and loads moved by abusive logistic systems. They are often used for military ammunition. Metal pallets make up less than 1% of the market. Materials include carbon steel, stainless steel, and aluminum. Of these, carbon steel offers excellent durability at the lowest cost. Stainless steel doesn’t require a paint coating, and is preferred for such applications as clean room environments. Aluminum offers the durability of steel at a lighter weight. Carbon steel units are expensive compared to wood, and stainless and aluminum cost about 2-3 times that of carbon steel. Long term costs, however, can be lower than wood.

Aluminum pallets are stronger than wood or plastic, lighter than steel, and resist weather, rotting, plastic creep and corrosion. They are sometimes used for air-freight, long-term outdoor or at-sea storage, or military transport.

Choosing the right size and right type of pallet is important for many reasons, but most important are the considerations of maximising your available storage space, reducing transport costs and ensuring goods are handled efficiently during all phases of the the transport cycle.

We have put together some useful information for your reference, to help you determine what are the best pallet storage and pallet shipping options for your business.

ISO pallets

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) sanctions six pallet dimensions, detailed in ISO Standard 6780: Flat pallets for intercontinental materials handling—Principal dimensions and tolerances

European pallets

EuroPallet

In Europe, the EURO pallet is widely used in many industries. It measures 800 by 1200 by 120 mm. Manufacturers of EURO pallets must be sanctioned by the European Pallet Association (EPAL), which governs the smallest details, even which types of nails and timber may be used. The strict standardization is based on the existence of europool pallet swap organizations. Most freight forwarders handling pallet shipping and pallet delivery will accept pool pallets handling the cost clearing between sender and receiver even for international transport to countries that take part in the europool system. The EURO pallet does not fit efficiently within the ISO shipping container and slightly wider containers are often used for this reason.

The four common sizes of EURO pallet (alongside with ISO alternative sizes) are:

North American pallets

Of the top pallets used in North America, the most commonly used by far is the Grocery Manufacturers’ Association (GMA) pallet, which accounts for 30% of all new wood pallets produced in the United States. The ISO also recognizes the GMA pallet footprint as one of its six standard sizes.

Australian Standard Pallets

The Australian Standard Pallet is a pallet size commonly found in Australia but found rarely elsewhere. It is a square hardwood pallet 1165 mm by 1165 mm in size which fits perfectly in the containerAustralia also requires more stringent import standards than the globally accepted ISPM 15 wood packaging material regulations. Australia requires the wood packaging material used for international shipping to be completely bark free and be treated and fumigated.