Demand grows for reusable shipping systems
Company president Lyle Shuert sits astride several of his firm's products-a reusable container, and a mail handling hamper and pallet for the U.S. Postal Service.
By Staff -- Modern Materials Handling, 6/1/1999
Lyle Shuert, president, Shuert Industries, Inc., Detroit, predicts demand will grow for reusable shipping systems, storage containers, pallets, and dunnage.The Motor City is where this former sculptor turned inventor began carving out a special niche in a particular corner of the plastic business-twin-sheet thermoformed polyethylene-and applying this technology to packaging for materials handling.
After starting his firm in 1971, Shuert foresaw a future with more reusable packaging and recycling. These trends were-and still are-especially true for auto manufacture and parts supply to Detroit's assembly lines. Automakers want to avoid single- or limited-use, disposable, non-recyclable packaging as much as possible.
Though providing auto industry uses for reusable containers and dunnage has been a Shuert focus for years, since the mid-1980s it's been less than half of the company's business. Textile applications have grown in importance. Like manufacture of autos, production of textiles has a closed loop, supply chain configuration.
"We've developed reusable products which consist of pallets and dividers to hold the different configurations of tubes and cones of yarn," Shuert says. One goal is to pack more pounds of yarn per truckload shipped.
According to Shuert, industries that are good candidates for applying reusable shipping systems have these factors in common:
- There's a closed-loop supply chain, or as much of one as possible.
- The volume and number of turns per year around the loop is great enough to reduce per use costs of durable, long-lasting plastic products, compared to wooden pallets and corrugated containers.
Shipping systems for hard disk drives for computers, childproof caps and similar product closures for pharmaceuticals and other drugs, and components for electronic equipment are all among opportunities for reusable packaging, he says.
There are no other articles related to this article.Talkback
Related Content
Related Content
Sponsored Links
View All Blogs
