Pickup requests for empty gaylords and corrugated

What a pickup request needs

• Count and footprint of the gaylords, and any loose corrugated beyond them
• Standing or knocked down; flat boxes are easy to load and cost less dock space
• Dock door type and hours, and whether a liftgate is needed
• A schedule: weekly, monthly, one time

Docks in a waste-ban state

Massachusetts bans recyclable cardboard from disposal, and RecyclingWorks advises businesses to talk to their hauler about a compactor or baler. Our request is for the boxes themselves: sound ones sold on, the rest recycled as clean OCC.

Standing versus flat

A standing 48 x 40 x 36 box takes about 40 cubic feet. Knocked down it is a slab a couple of inches thick. If you are short of dumpster room, flatten the boxes and stack them on a pallet; the calculator shows the difference in your own numbers.

No price, minimum or turnaround is stated here. Worn board goes the OCC way; wet or waxed board see waxed and wet.

The dock access questions

A truck needs to get to the boxes, and a pickup request is easier to answer when the dock side of that is written down. Is there a dock door or a ground-level loading area? Is there a liftgate or a ramp? Is the approach tight, as it can be in dense industrial districts? Is there a time window the dock insists on? Nothing here is unusual, and none of it is a problem, but a driver who arrives without it can lose an hour.

Flat is easier

If you have the time, knocking boxes down before a pickup saves space and loading time. Stack them with the bottoms facing the same way, band them to a pallet and keep them dry. If you cannot, say in the request whether the boxes are standing or knocked down, because the two are handled differently.

Before the truck arrives

Clear a path between the stack and the door. Remove plastic liners, strapping and loose film, which do not belong with clean board. Keep the stack dry: a rainstorm on an open dock can turn a recyclable stack into a contaminated one. If the stack is large, mark off the boxes that are sound, so they can be set aside rather than baled.

Pickup frequency

A dock with a steady stream might want a weekly or fortnightly pickup; a dock with a seasonal peak might want one in the busy weeks only. State the pattern that suits you, and what happens when the stack grows early.

Mention any dock restrictions, such as noise limits or quiet hours.