February 2021

At Palmstead we do everything we can to be sustainable and work towards becoming carbon neutral.

We plan our transport operations meticulously, grouping loads together where we can, and avoiding return journeys to collect empties.

For this reason, we often pack plants into pallet boxes. Pallet boxes are - as the name would suggest - standard wooden pallets with a cardboard sleeve that forms a box sitting on the top.

Packing the plants into them is something of an art, carried out by our experienced pickers and packers. The plants are carefully stacked in a way which both protects them and prevents the compost escaping, the latter assisted by most pots being topped with bark.

We deliver them in our curtain sided lorries, all of which are equipped with pallet trucks and tail lifts, but we do need to drop them off kerbside or on a suitable flat, hard surface accessible by a lorry.

Pallet boxes can be left at the point of delivery with the plants still inside, which can be very useful for customers, especially if they have a forklift or telehandler available, as the plants can be put straight onto a vehicle ready to be taken to site for laying out and planting.

If you’re not planning to plant straight away, you will need a place where you can safely unload the pallet boxes and lay your plants out. If they are going to be set down for more than a couple of days, you may need to arrange water them, depending on the time of year.

Once you’ve unloaded your pallet boxes you can keep them, the cardboard comes off and folds flat very easily - it has a hundred uses, particularly when it’s muddy - and a pallet is always useful.