A pallet system for small spaces

By Marcia Miquelon, Outreach Specialist
UW Madison Healthy Farmers, Healthy Profits Project

Small-scale vegetable farmers lift and carry heavy produce boxes daily. Yet these common tasks carry with them the specter of back injury and the everyday reality of body fatigue. Larger operations often palletize and use motor-driven forklifts to move vegetables through the washing, packing and delivery process. Small-scale growers often don't have room or capital for such a system.

A simple, hand operated narrow pallet system works well to move produce through tight spaces in a packing shed or through narrow cooler doorways. Standard rectangular or square containers or waxed cardboard boxes of produce can stack easily on narrow "half" pallets (15" x 24"). These stacks can then be moved with a specialized hand pallet truck.

At Vermont Valley Farm near Blue Mounds, Wisconsin, Barb and Dave Perkins pack 550 assorted produce boxes every week for their Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) members. With a crew of five people and one hand pallet truck it takes them only two hours. Before they started using narrow pallets, they were hand carrying up to four boxes at a time. "Now," says Barb Perkins, "we stack sixteen (5/9 bushel) boxes on one pallet. We're not doing very much lifting at all anymore. They've made a huge difference."

The system has many advantages over a regular hand truck, as well. When boxes are stacked on narrow pallets, they are easier to pick up and the stack is more stable. Since pallets keep the boxes off the ground, the boxes stay cleaner and last longer. And the produce gets more air, keeping it fresh longer.

"If some salesman had walked in the door and tried to sell me [this system] before I tried it," Dave Perkins adds, "I would've told him to get out of here. But now, it would be the one of the first things I'd tell someone who's getting into this business to spend their money on, provided they have a hard-surfaced work area." The hand pallet truck rolls best on asphalt or concrete, but may also be used on hard, smooth ground.

Narrow pallets are available from materials handling companies, such as Valley Craft, Lake City, MN, (http://valleycraft.com/). For more information, contact the Healthy Farmers, Healthy Profits Project at (608) 262-1054, or visit their website at http:// bse.wisc.edu/hfhp/.

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