Electric Pallet Jack vs. Electric Walkie Rider

A walkie rider, often referred to as a rider pallet jack or rider pallet truck, is a type of electric material handling equipment used for transporting and moving pallets in warehouses and distribution centers. It is designed to be ridden by the operator, providing several advantages over a standard electric pallet jack, which is typically operated by walking behind it. Here are some benefits of a walkie rider over a standard electric pallet jack:

1. Operator Efficiency: The most significant advantage of a walkie rider is that it allows the operator to ride on the equipment. This reduces operator fatigue, increases productivity, and allows for faster and more efficient material handling tasks, especially for long-distance transporting.
2. Faster Travel Speed: Walkie rider pallet jacks generally have higher travel speeds compared to standard electric pallet jacks. This speed improvement can result in quicker cycle times and more efficient operations.
3. Reduced Operator Strain: Since the operator rides on the walkie rider, there is less physical strain on the operator’s body compared to walking behind a standard pallet jack. This can lead to improved ergonomics and a lower risk of workplace injuries.
4. Higher Weight Capacity: Walkie rider pallet jacks often have a higher weight capacity than standard pallet jacks. This allows them to handle heavier loads, making them suitable for heavier-duty applications.
5. Maneuverability: Walkie rider pallet jacks are designed to be highly maneuverable, allowing operators to navigate tight spaces and crowded aisles more easily. This can be crucial in warehouses with limited space.
6. Battery Life: Many walkie rider pallet jacks come with larger batteries, offering longer runtimes between charges compared to standard pallet jacks. This can increase uptime and productivity.
7. Versatility: Walkie rider pallet jacks can perform multiple tasks, such as transporting, stacking, and order picking, making them versatile tools for warehouse operations.
8. Operator Comfort: The rider platform on a walkie rider is designed for operator comfort, often equipped with cushioned platforms and adjustable controls to reduce operator fatigue during long shifts.
9. Safety Features: Walkie rider pallet jacks typically come with safety features such as brake systems, horn signals, and enhanced visibility, ensuring the safety of both the operator and pedestrians.
10. Reduced Operator Footprint: Because the operator rides on the equipment, there is less of an operator footprint in the aisle. This allows for more efficient use of space in crowded warehouses.

While walkie rider pallet jacks offer numerous benefits, it’s essential to consider your specific material handling needs and the layout of your facility when choosing between a walkie rider and a standard electric pallet jack. Walkie riders are well-suited for applications where speed, efficiency, and operator comfort are critical, but they may not be the best choice for all warehouse settings.  For more information on our CLARK electric pallet jacks, electric walkie rider, stackers or any other material handling product, please contact us at 800-322-5435.

The Benefits of Clean Floors in Your Warehouse and Storage Operation

Clean floors have many benefits besides improving safety. Your manufacturing and warehousing operation benefits in other ways, including:

1. Floor Cleaning: Sweepers and scrubbers are specifically designed to efficiently clean warehouse floors. Sweepers use rotating brushes and suction systems to collect dust, debris, and loose particles from the floor, ensuring a tidy environment. Scrubbers, on the other hand, utilize water, cleaning solutions, and scrubbing brushes to remove dirt, stains, and grime from the floor surface. 
2. Improved Safety: A clean warehouse floor contributes to a safer working environment. Sweepers and scrubbers help eliminate hazards such as loose debris, spills, and dust, reducing the risk of slips, trips, and falls for your employees. By maintaining a clean floor, you create a safer space for material handling equipment and reduce the chances of accidents caused by obstructions.
3. Increased Productivity: A clean and organized warehouse promotes efficient operations. By utilizing sweepers and scrubbers, you can quickly clean large floor areas, minimizing downtime and allowing your staff to focus on core tasks rather than manual sweeping or mopping. This can lead to increased productivity, as your employees can work in a clutter-free and orderly environment.
4. Equipment Maintenance: Warehouse floors can accumulate dust, dirt, and debris over time, which may damage your material handling equipment. Sweepers and scrubbers help remove these particles from the floor, reducing the chances of machinery clogging, abrasive damage to wheels or belts, and other equipment issues. Regular cleaning can extend the lifespan of your equipment and reduce maintenance costs.
5. Compliance with Regulations: Depending on your location and industry, there may be specific regulations or standards regarding warehouse cleanliness and safety. Using sweepers and scrubbers can help you meet these requirements, ensuring your warehouse is compliant with health and safety guidelines. Compliance not only helps you avoid penalties but also promotes a positive image for your business.
6. Environmental Benefits: Many modern sweepers and scrubbers are designed to be eco-friendly. They often employ features such as water recycling systems, energy-efficient motors, and reduced water consumption, which help minimize their environmental impact. By using sustainable cleaning equipment, you can contribute to your warehouse’s overall sustainability goals.

Remember that the specific benefits and effectiveness of sweepers and scrubbers may vary based on factors such as the size of your warehouse, the type of flooring, the level of foot and vehicle traffic, and the nature of the operations carried out within your facility. It’s important to select the appropriate equipment and maintenance routine that suits your specific requirements.

Keeping the Heat IN This Winter

Winter is upon us, which means increased energy expenses to keep your warehouse warm and productive. While Southern California is not as effected by colder weather as our friends on the east coast, we will still be turning on the heat and anything we can do to minimize the impact of that on our bottom is helpful to a profitable 2020.

The following steps are five of our top recommendations for reducing energy consumption without turning down the thermostat.

Ensure Efficient Heat Generation Processes

Whatever thermal system you use, now is the time to make sure it is up to date with regular maintenance. Keeping your system in good operating order extends its life and ensures that it operates at optimal efficiency. Meanwhile, a poorly maintained system—particularly a gas-fired one—can pose a significant safety risk.

Another area of concern is the quantity, type, and location of your heating units. If you have made any changes to your warehouse configuration since your HVAC system was installed, now would be a good time for consultation. Technology advances quickly, and you want to be sure your HVAC system is up-to-date with current technology to ensure efficiency and effectiveness.

Maintain Proper Air Circulation

We all know that heat rises, and 20-degree temperature variances between the warehouse floor and the typical 40-foot ceiling are not uncommon. Circulating warmth to the floor can save hundreds—if not thousands—of dollars each month during the winter. The best means to accomplish this is through large industrial ceiling fans.

Determining what size, how many, and where to install industrial ceiling fans is our specialty. Fans can save up to 30 percent of your heating costs and deliver positive ROI in less than two years in many applications. Contact us for more information on fans and how many you might need to improve your energy circulation.

Retain as Much Heat as Possible

If you operate a warehouse, you have doors—very large doors. Although it is impossible to eliminate heat exchanges with cold outdoor air, you can take specific steps to significantly reduce it. These steps are more cost-effective than you probably expect.

Insulated dock panel doors can help retain warm air. However, depending on the number of dock positions, investment in them can be prohibitively costly. Instead, consider an insulation kit for each door. Insulation kits are less expensive, provide an R-Value of 6.81, and are easy to install.

Gaps around your dock doors can also cause significant heat loss. Inspect the top, bottom, and both sides of each door. If you see daylight, you are losing energy. Weather stripping kits are available to fill these gaps. The kits include weather stripping for the perimeter of the door as well as a 5-inch double-loop bottom rubber astragal to ensure that doors close tightly at the bottom. In addition to preserving heat, the seals keep bugs and other debris outside your warehouse facility. Caulking and sealants available at your local DIY big box store can help improve retention of heat dramatically over the winter.

Dock seals or shelters are imperative for preventing tremendous heat loss during trailer loading and unloading. If you are running a high-traffic operation without seals or even with worn seals, tens of thousands of expensive BTUs can blow out the door each winter day. If your seals or shelters are in good condition, be sure each tractor trailer is backed up tight against them before the dock doors are opened. Many types of dock seals and shelters are available. We can help you choose the right ones for your doors and budget.

One final area we recommend assessing is your dock leveler. If you use pit-mounted levelers, it makes sense to ensure that the side and rear seals are in good condition. Worn seals on your dock leveler result in air infiltration. We can inspect your levelers and seals, and service or replace any that are worn

Install Windows and/or Skylights

Although it is not always practical depending on the construction of your warehouse (or if you own or lease it), we certainly recommend investigating ways to improve the natural light and heat generated by the sun! Strategically placed windows or skylights can dramatically reduce your warehouse energy costs during the winter not only by using the sun’s energy for heat, but also by improving the natural lighting in your warehouse. This reduces your reliance on lighting fixtures and further reduces your energy costs. Using retractable blinds allows you to close the windows during the summer months, which reduces heat generation when it is not required.

And if you facility has windows, consider replacing them with energy efficient windows that can provide better heat retention and help keep the cold air out. If your windows are more than 10 years old, chances are you can improve energy consumption with new, more efficient windows.

Use Air Curtains or High-Speed Doors to Segment Your Warehouse Energy Needs

Some areas of your warehouse may not be used by employees often, who do most of their work in other areas of your warehouse. These low-use areas can be kept much cooler than the areas that employees use most. Air curtains and high-speed doors are excellent ways to keep the two areas temperature controlled while dramatically decreasing your energy consumption.

Winter can be an expensive time for warehouse operators, but the right steps taken the right way can significantly reduce the negative impact to your bottom line. We can help you find the right products to ensure you’re maximizing the use of energy in your facility during the colder winter months. Contact us at 800-322-5438 to speak to one of our representatives.

Four Traits of Safety Minded Companies

When companies are safety-minded these are four things that almost all of them do proactively to ensure a safe operation.

As managers and owners, we want a safe work environment for all of our employees. Unfortunately, all too often it escapes us. Time passes quickly, and initiatives that were once important standards become guidelines or even merely suggestions. How can we ensure that when we put safety measures in place, they will stay in place as employees come and go in a business climate that is constantly in flux?While we lack the space to answer this question in full detail here, there are a few major approaches to providing a safe work environment that transcend industries, equipment and facilities. We outline these “hows and whys” of workplace safety below.

Since 1970, OSHA has worked to create a safer workplace for all employees, and their mission has been very successful. However, accidents still happen, and not only at companies willfully violating OSHA standards. Sometimes safety goes beyond meeting standards due to unique circumstances in certain operations.

The following are a few approaches to safety that have helped both large and small companies to achieve better workplace safety, fewer incidents and accidents, lower costs, more productivity and better workplace attitudes.

Safety is integrated with company mission – Safe companies put as much emphasis on doing things safely as on doing them productively. From day one, every employee knows they are working for a company that would rather they do their job safely than quickly. These employees will lockout a piece of equipment when something goes wrong, will replace light bulbs that need it instead of ignoring them and will report unsafe behavior or unsafe conditions.

Training never ends – Employees are involved in ongoing training – how to lift more safely, how to sit properly in a chair, how to operate a certain piece of equipment and so on. Your business is fluid: things change; equipment changes; and equipment, building space and employees are added. As your conditions change, your training must address these changes. Training for the safest work environments is never a one-time event or a two- or three-day training initiation. It is an ongoing pursuit of the safest possible work facility. It should be a goal of all employees to see that their coworkers go home safe every night.

Involvement at all levels – While involvement in a safe work environment must start from the corner office, the mission and strategy it is also important to ensure that every employee knows that they are involved and responsible. It is a good idea to create safety teams for every facet of your business, to revolve people in and out of those teams, and to have them conduct frequent facility or department reviews to identify potential threats. The most successful companies have reward systems for reporting anything that could be a potential threat, even if it is as minor as a sharp corner on a coat rack. This keeps all employees engaged in creating a safe work environment.

Accountability – Once you have established your safety mission and mapped out your strategy, everyone involved must be held accountable. No one can shirk their safety responsibilities. If a sharp corner on a coat rack is missed and someone gets cut, find out why no one noticed. Are they doing regular inspections? If safety standards are not being met, it is the leadership’s job to find out why and fix it. Everyone must know that if an accident happens on their watch, it must be accounted for and a plan must be designed to ensure that it will not happen again.

A truly safe, productive and profitable workplace is attained through ongoing efforts, and these are just a few of the major traits of successful organizations. We encourage you to seek the assistance of OSHA, NIOSH or other private safety consultants to help you organize and strategize your safety plans.

If there is anything we can help you with in regard to your equipment and its operators, please contact us at 800-322-5438. We would be happy to assist you!

The Flu, Its Cost and How to Avoid it

Each flu season in America, between 5% and 20% of American’s contract the flu. This leads to 111 million lost productive work days, which costs American business approximately 7 billion dollars! In addition, the direct costs (doctor’s visits, medication, hospitalization) cost individuals over 4.5 billion dollars a year! Source: CDC Whether it’s in your accounting department or forklift operators, you want to limit an outbreak at your company and contain any outbreak that does occur.

The effects of lost productivity can have a great effect on your ability to deliver products and services and provide customer service, which can lead to a negative impact on your bottom line. But there are things you can do to lower the risk at the department level and facility level. It all starts with planning and communication.

1. Developing a plan to combat influenza? Businesses plan for all sorts of calamities and naturally occurring disasters. Does your company have a preparedness plan to prevent a flu outbreak? A tremendous amount of information is available to help you plan for and combat an outbreak of the flu a http://www.flu.gov/planning-preparedness/business/
2. Educate your employees and take steps to encourage vaccination.One study showed a decrease in over 71% in hospitalizations when a flu vaccination was administered to adults of all ages (source). Flu vaccines not only reduce the chances of contracting the flu, but it also reduces the effects of the flu if an employee contracts it, thus enabling them to get back to full productivity sooner.
3. Use Resources.The CDC has a great Business Tool Kit to help you educate your employees about the flu, how to prevent it and what to do if you think you are coming down with it. Visit the CDC Business Tool Kit Webapge.
4. Proper sanitary proceduresare also essential during the flu season. Placing hand sanitizers throughout your facility and encouraging if not outright requiring their use will help contain the spread of the virus, should an employee become infected. There are additional steps you can take to prevent the spread of the flu, including increasing janitorial services or assigning teams to assist in the sanitization of routinely used and shared points, such as water fountains, door knobs/handles, bathrooms, and kitchens.
5. Send them home!If an employee starts to show the signs of influenza, it’s important to remove them from the facility as soon as possible and require that they remain home until symptoms have subsided, particularly a fever.
6. Seek immediate attention. If you or anyone around starts to feel fatigue, loss of appetite, lethargy, fever or any of the other first signs of the flu, get to a doctor and ask about anti-viral drugs. These drugs can cut your misery in half, as well as your time off work, and productivity.

The effects of flu season can be dramatic if left unaddressed. But developing a plan to deal with the flu and spreading education before the flu spreads itself around your facility will help you maintain your business productivity during this flu season.

Our focus is frequently on productivity, and this is not always about equipment and processes. Sometimes peripheral components can have an impact on our bottom lines, and it is important to us to serve as your partner in addressing all facts of productivity. We encourage you to visit the flu.gov site to learn more.

Tips to Lower Your Material Handling Costs

Reducing your costs means increasing your profits and increasing your profits has never been more challenging than in recent years.  Our experience with hundreds of various types of operations, utilizing hundreds of pieces of equipment in more than a thousand ways, has exposed us to thousands of variations in facilities, equipment, and applications. In working with these diverse clients, we have recognized commonalities that, when implemented, resulted in lower total operating costs for materials handling most of the time. Following are five that we highly recommend:

Choose Application-Specific Equipment – In other words, “buy the right equipment for the job at hand.” We often see equipment being used in applications for which they were not designed. That results in accelerated wear, increased damage and ultimately, increased costs. Working with professionals who can survey your applications and recommend the right equipment for each job is one of the most important things you can do to decrease overall costs.  Using the proper equipment with the right specifications means efficient, productive results.

Planned Maintenance – Your fleet equipment works hard. And hard-working equipment needs proper maintenance.  Working with a professional and reputable fleet service provider that serves you at appropriate intervals is the key to catching small maintenance issues, before they become larger and much more expensive. In addition, well-maintained equipment operates more efficiently, experiences more up-time and results in improved operator morale.

Invest in a Robust Training Program – Operator safety training is required by OSHA, and a daily inspection of equipment is one of OSHA’s requirements. Most companies train their operators regarding safe operation, but more often than not, the training stops there. Clients that invest in training employees to perform daily inspections, and to know what to look for, see results. If you install a process for equipment that will eventually need repair, you can ensure that unsafe equipment stays off the operating floor, and small repairs can be handled before they blossom into colossal nightmares.

Work With Single-Source Dealerships When Possible – The more work you can assign to a qualified and reliable supplier, the fewer calls you have to make. In turn, the supplier becomes more familiar with your equipment, facility and applications. This leads to greater efficiencies for you. It also allows your supplier to better understand your operation and thus make logical suggestions that can reduce your costs, increase your efficiency and productivity, and ultimately improve your bottom line.

Fleet Management – Whether you do it yourself or assign responsibility to your materials handling partner, fleet management is a key part of knowing the useful economic lifespan of your equipment. And economic lifespan may vary by application within your operation. If you keep a finger on the pulse of your maintenance expenses and know when it’s time to trade in or re-lease, that process will more than pay for itself in the long run.

There are hundreds of other things you can do to minimize the total operating costs of your facility. We have addressed some of them in previous feature articles. We hope that you have found these Top Five useful.  If we can assist you further, or provide you with more information, please contact us at 888-322-LIFT.

Avoid the Flu Like the Plague

Each flu season in America, between 5% and 20% of American’s contract the flu. This leads to 111 million lost productive work days, which costs American business approximately 7 billion dollars! In addition, the direct costs (doctor’s visits, medication, hospitalization) cost individuals over 4.5 billion dollars a year! Source: CDC

Whether it’s in your accounting department or forklift operators, you want to limit an outbreak at your company and contain any outbreak that does occur.

The effects of lost productivity can have a great effect on your ability to deliver products and services and provide customer service, which can lead to a negative impact on your bottom line. But there are things you can do to lower the risk at the department level and facility level. It all starts with planning and communication.

1. Developing a plan to combat influenza? Businesses plan for all sorts of calamities and naturally occurring disasters. Does your company have a preparedness plan to prevent a flu outbreak? A tremendous amount of information is available to help you plan for and combat an outbreak of the flu a http://www.flu.gov/planning-preparedness/business/
2. Educate your employees and take steps to encourage vaccination. One study showed a decrease in over 71% in hospitalizations when a flu vaccination was administered to adults of all ages (source). Flu vaccines not only reduce the chances of contracting the flu, but it also reduces the effects of the flu if an employee contracts it, thus enabling them to get back to full productivity sooner.
3. Use Resources. The CDC has a great Business Tool Kit to help you educate your employees about the flu, how to prevent it and what to do if you think you are coming down with it. Visit the CDC Business Tool Kit Webapge.
4. Proper sanitary procedures are also essential during the flu season. Placing hand sanitizers throughout your facility and encouraging if not outright requiring their use will help contain the spread of the virus, should an employee become infected. There are additional steps you can take to prevent the spread of the flu, including increasing janitorial services or assigning teams to assist in the sanitization of routinely used and shared points, such as water fountains, door knobs/handles, bathrooms, and kitchens.
5. Send them home! If an employee starts to show the signs of influenza, it’s important to remove them from the facility as soon as possible and require that they remain home until symptoms have subsided, particularly a fever.
6. Seek immediate attention. If you or anyone around starts to feel fatigue, loss of appetite, lethargy, fever or any of the other first signs of the flu, get to a doctor and ask about anti-viral drugs. These drugs can cut your misery in half, as well as your time off work, and productivity.

The effects of flu season can be dramatic if left unaddressed. But developing a plan to deal with the flu and spreading education before the flu spreads itself around your facility will help you maintain your business productivity during this flu season.

Our focus is frequently on productivity, and this is not always about equipment and processes. Sometimes peripheral components can have an impact on our bottom lines, and it is important to us to serve as your partner in addressing all facts of productivity. We encourage you to visit the flu.gov site to learn more.

Four Reasons to Consider Electric Forklifts

Slowly but surely, electric forklifts are carrying more of the daily material handling load. Some of the reasons are obvious, but it is clear to most that eventually we must do more than continue to burn fossil fuels in the transportation of our products.

We still have a ways to go before electric forklifts can perform all the tasks as well as their LP forklift counterparts. However, most forklift manufacturers are improving performance and outdoor durability with each passing year. It is only a matter of time before they catch up.  There a good reasons for this transfer of power, a few major reasons are:

1. Reduced maintenance costs – Electric forklifts have fewer moving parts than their internal combustion counterparts. Fewer parts, means reduced maintenance, which results in a considerable reduction in maintenance.
2. Greatly reduced environmental impact – Electric forklift do not burn fossil fuels, reducing carbon footprint. They also require no disposal of motor oils. The units stay cleaner as a result and so does your operation!
3. Improved ergonomics and working environment – Electric forklifts are quieter with nearly no vibrations to deal with. This provides a more comfortable operating atmosphere for your forklift operators as well as the rest of the personnel that work around your lift trucks. Noise in your facility is reduced to almost zero when it comes to your lift trucks, making communications between employees easier.
4. Supply chain trends to go green – Every year, more and more companies are encouraging if not outright requiring their suppliers to improve their impact on the environment and electric forklifts are one of the major steps that companies are taking to do so.

While we have some work to do, it’s pretty clear that electric forklifts are making great strides to become a mainstay in materials handling equipment. And right now with the introduction of Lithium Ion Batteries in our BYD Forklift line-up and Section 179 tax deductions, there has never been a better time to consider trading in your internal combustion forklifts for a smooth running, cost saving electric powered lift truck.

To learn more about electric lift trucks and what they can mean to your operation, please contact us at 800-322-LIFT.

Purchase Price vs. Total Ownership Cost

When you are purchasing a piece of equipment, you obtain competitive quotes, verify specifications and generate a purchase order. For that matter, just about anything we purchase goes through the same process. However, there is much more to purchasing forklifts and other material handling equipment. We have found, over the years, that often there are variables that can greatly affect the total cost of ownership of anything, be it an automobile, forklift or a giant cargo container. The price you pay for your piece of equipment, by most accounts, reflects about 10% of the total ownership costs of that piece of equipment. This leaves 90% of your total costs up in the air. Depending on many variables, you could pay much more for the equipment than you needed to, or much less. These variables include: Performance and Reliability of Equipment – Comparing cost per hour to operate can give you a good idea of what competing pieces of equipment will cost you over their useful life. When comparing cost per hour to operate, you should be sure you’re comparing similar models under similar circumstances. A lift truck operating 1500 hours a year for a light weight product manufacturer will cost far less over its lifetime than the same lift truck operating at a recycling facility.  This cost should reflect general maintenance requirements as well as fuel costs. Fuel Consumption – While this is often a part of performance and cost per hour, knowing the fuel costs for each comparing brand and calculating total costs over the life of the equipment can sometimes be quite an eye-opener. In addition, what are your fuel alternatives? Can you use electric models? Thinking outside the box may result in lower costs to power your forklift and other lift equipment. Specifications vs. Operations – It is rare that two 5,000-lb-capacity forklifts from competing brands will have similar specifications. Knowing what your facility will accommodate and comparing that with each model will give you insight into how each model will perform, given your operating parameters. Factors include: aisle width vs. turn radius, draw bar pull, suspension and ergonomics compared to your floor condition, indoor/outdoor use and ceiling height/rack height vs. max lift height. You will also want to compare features between brands to ensure that each lift truck model is equipped with the proper components to meet your operational requirements. For example: Can it operate properly inside your ice cream freezer? Ergonomics – A comfortable and smooth-running piece of equipment will provide you with increased productivity. These are costs hidden in equipment that are quite real in daily operating conditions. How much time and research and development, does each brand put into the comfort and ease of use of their equipment? Happy, comfortable operators are simply more productive. Safety – Never underestimate the safety features of your equipment. What equipment is being specified and what equipment is optional from each manufacturer is very important to know.  Reducing your accident costs or product/facility damage can make a big difference in your total fleet operational expenses. Useful Life – Finally, how many hours can you expect from each piece of equipment until the cost to operate becomes cost-prohibitive? This can vary widely depending upon brand and model. But having some qualitative and quantitative information on hand, if possible, will help you make a better decision about the total cost of operating each unit/model. There are many factors beyond price tag or lease rate that can help you make good decisions about the equipment you purchase. Having a partner that listens, evaluates and fulfills your needs is essential in building a fleet that is most productive and less costly in the long run. Contact us at 800-322-5438 to speak to one of our material handling professionals about the right material handling equipment for your operation.