Wooden pallets are essential part of the supply chain carrying approximately 80% of all products shipped domestically. The production of pallets is also strongly correlated with the U.S. G.D.P and manufacturing G.D.P. This research was conducted to obtain important information on the market and raw material usage trends in the wooden pallet and container industry from 2019 through 2021. These trends have been compared to historical data that has been collected by Virginia tech and U.S. Forest Service pallet surveys from 1991-2016. This study was conducted by sending out physical and online surveys to 2319 companies who produce and broker wooden pallets and crates. The wooden pallet and container industry produced and estimated 919 million new pallets in 2021 which is an estimated 75% increase since 2016. The 48"x40" pallet size continues to be the dominant new pallet size with a 29% market share. The share of softwood lumber used in the industry steadily increased since 2016 and accounted for 81% of the lumber used in pallet production. The industry used 38.6% percent of the total sawn softwood lumber produced and 37.6% of the total sawn hardwood lumber produced in the U.S. The industry also produced 280 million repaired and remanufactured pallets. This is an estimated 16.4% decrease from previous research conducted in 2016. In 2021 approximately 89% of all recovered wooden pallets are converted to repaired or remanufactured pallets. Approximately 22% of respondents stated that they were not affected by the pandemic. A majority of 51% of respondents stated that they exceeded their 2019 sales, with 12% seeing no change in sales in 2020 compared to 2019. / Master of Science / Wooden pallets are the backbone of the supply chain especially because 80 percent of the products produced in the US are transported on wooden pallets. The number of new wooden pallets produced annually also has a strong correlation to the U.S. manufacturing GDP that further highlights the importance of pallets. This study was conducted to obtain key information about the market trends in the wooden pallet industry from 2019-2021. This data was compared to historical trends researched by Virginia Tech and the U. S. Forest service from 1991-2016. This study was conducted by sending out physical and online surveys to 2319 companies who produce and broker wooden pallets and crates. This data is important so that companies can use it to make better descension by looking at the important modern trends in the industry. The wooden pallet industry continued to trend upward from previous surveys conducted. In 2021, total pallet production increased 40% from 2016 increasing to 1.18 billion. As pallet production increased so did material usage. In 2021 the wooden pallet industry used an estimated 17.9 billion board feet of lumber which is a 95% increase from 2016. As for repaired and recycled pallets there were an estimated 280 million produced in 2021. This is a 16.4% decrease from the previous survey conducted. Though with this decrease approximately 89% of all received pallet cores were either repaired or used during the remanufacturing process. This study also delved into the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic on the wooden pallet and container industry. The results of the covid section implied that the industry was stable throughout the pandemic. Approximately 22% of respondents stated that they were not affected by the pandemic. A majority of 51% of respondents stated that they exceeded their 2019 sales, with 12% seeing no change in sales in 2020 compared to 2019.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/117915 |
| Date | 09 February 2024 |
| Creators | Hobbs, Sean Patrick |
| Contributors | Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation, Horvath, Laszlo, Smith, Robert L., Bush, Robert J. |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | ETD, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
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