01The internal argument
When we decided to publish numeric grade criteria on the website, the objection from the yard was not about honesty. It was about Friday afternoons.
Every yard has a version of this. A load has to ship. There are 480 good pallets and 20 that are borderline — a companion stringer here, a third replaced board there. In a world of unpublished criteria, those 20 go on the truck and nobody ever knows. In a world of published criteria, they do not, and either the load goes short or somebody stays late.
That is the actual cost of transparency in this business. Not embarrassment — yield and flexibility.
02What we published
| Criterion | Grade A | Grade B | Grade C |
|---|---|---|---|
| Companion stringers | 0 | ≤2 | Unlimited |
| Replaced deck boards | ≤2 | ≤5 | Any, if secured |
| Plugs / mend plates | ≤1 plug, 0 plates | ≤3 | Any |
| Broken or missing boards | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Protruding fasteners | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Diagonal variance | ≤0.5 in | ≤0.75 in | ≤1.0 in |
Nothing there is remarkable. What is unusual is that it is numeric and public, so a customer can hold us to it and a grader cannot argue with it.
03What changed afterwards
- Grade A yield fell by roughly four percentage points in the first quarter. That is the drift we had accumulated, made visible.
- Grade B volume rose correspondingly, and B sells perfectly well.
- Disputes dropped sharply. An argument about whether a pallet is Grade A becomes a measurement rather than an opinion.
- Customers started inspecting more, which we expected and which turned out to be a benefit — they tell us within a day when something drifts.
- Our reject rate on repeat accounts settled under 0.4%.
04What to ask your own supplier
- Ask for their grade criteria in writing. Not a description — the document.
- Check whether it contains numbers. 'Minimal repairs' is not a criterion.
- Ask what their inspection and rejection protocol is. If there is none, the criteria are decorative.
- Ask who grades — the same person at intake and exit, or two people?
- Ask what happens to a pallet that fails twice.
The answers tell you a great deal, and so does the speed with which they arrive. A yard that has these documents ready is a yard that has thought about them. More on how the vocabulary works in grades explained, and on why definitions drift in an earlier piece.
