Sensize talks to a lot of people about reusable containers. It’s not unusual for new customers to tell us that they lose 20% of their container fleet or more per year. One customer was losing 50% of their magnum boxes every year. These are huge plastic boxes that weigh 100kg when they are empty – try lifting one. Lay four side by side and they are the size of a family hatchback. Not the most attractive item to steal you might think, and certainly not the easiest. Yet tens of thousands of them go missing every year. The situation is, if anything, worse for smaller containers like crates, totes and roll cages.
This is a problem because everyone, especially at this time of COP26, understands we need to stop using disposable packaging. Reusable containers like magnums, totes and roll cages last for 10 years or more. Each has the potential to eliminate thousands of wasteful cardboard boxes and wooden pallets. But it all breaks down when they are lost. A lost container might as well be disposable.
Where are all these missing containers going? Some really are stolen - metal roll cages have scrap value. For most the reason is more mundane: in the organized chaos of the supply chain, they end up in the wrong place and are lost forever.
And that’s where tracking helps. If you know where your missing containers are (because the tracking system tells you) you can simply go pick them up. Problem solved!
It’s not always that easy. You’d have to be brave to try to recover a roll cage from a scrap yard. And if your magnum is in a competitor’s supply chain, there is no easy way to get it back. Even so, tracking helps because it tells you who sent your items to the unauthorized site. Often a warning or some extra training can stop it from happening again. If not, you can justifiably issue an invoice for the cost of the missing item.
Another, less tangible but very real benefit is that knowing items are tracked changes behaviour. Tracked containers almost always get treated better. At Sensize we think every container should benefit from this. Contact us to find out how we can help you to track all your containers.
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