• About Skids & Pallets
• Glossary of Terms

Pallet - A portable, horizontal, rigid platform used as a base for assembling, storing, stacking, handling and transporting goods as a unit load, often equipped with a superstructure

One of the largest pallet organizations in the world is the quality-oriented NWPCA (National Wooden Pallet and Container Association). A growing number of NWPCA Pallet Professionals™ have expanded their product lines and services to include plastic, composites, etc., in order to better serve their customers' diverse shipping needs.

Information and pallet graphics which follow are courtesy of NWPCA.

WOOD - Wood pallets are the only pallet made from a reusable, repairable, recyclable, cost effective, and renewable resource.

PLASTIC - Uniform in size and weight, plastic pallets offer high reusability. Many plastic pallets are constructed of recycled materials. A growing number are repairable and recyclable.

METAL - Generally made from light weight steel, aluminum or stainless steel, with all welded construction, galvanized or painted finish, and having extended life expectancy.

COMPOSITES - Typically created from uncontaminated, selected wood waste, these pallets are themselves recyclable.

PAPER/CORRUGATED - Lightweight, manufactured of recyclable corrugated sheets.

BLOCK PALLET - Block is a type of pallet with blocks between the pallet decks or beneath the top deck

CPC PALLET - Wood Pallets manufactured and repaired to Canadian Pallet Council Pallet Manufacturing & Repair Specifications.

DOUBLE-FACE PALLET - A pallet with top and bottom decks

DOUBLE-WING PALLET - A pallet with top and bottom deckboards extending beyond the edges of the stringers or stringerboards

EXCHANGE PALLET - A pallet intended for use among a designated group of shippers and receivers where ownership of the pallet is transferred with the ownership of the unit load; common pool pallet

EXPENDABLE PALLET - A pallet intended for a series of handlings during a single trip from shipper to receiver; it is then disposed; see Shipping Pallet

EURO PALLET

FLUSH PALLET - A pallet with deckboards flush with the stringers, stringer-boards or blocks along the sides of the pallet

FOUR-WAY BLOCK PALLET - A pallet with openings at both pallet ends and along pallet sides sufficient to admit hand-pallet jacks; full four-way entry pallet.

NON-REVERSIBLE PALLET - A pallet with bottom deckboard configuration different from top deck

PALLET COLLAR - Collapsible wooden container or bin which transforms a pallet into a box

PANEL DECK PALLET - Pallet constructed with composite or structural panel top deck

PARTIAL FOUR-WAY STRINGER PALLET - A pallet with notched stringers

POST PALLET - A pallet fitted with posts or blocks between the decks or beneath the top deck; see block pallet

PLYWOOD PALLET

RENTAL PALLET - A pallet owned by a third party, different from the actual pallet user

SPEQ™ PALLET - Uniform Standard for Wood Pallets - SPEQ™ Pallets must meet an identical level of quality, regardless of who builds them or for what application they are built. Licensed SPEQ™ suppliers must pass an ongoing series of stringent surprise quality inspections by an independent quality auditor.

RETURNABLE/REUSABLE PALLET - A pallet designed to be used for more than one trip

REVERSIBLE PALLET - A pallet with identical top and bottom decks

SHIPPING PALLET - Pallet designed to be used for a single one-way trip from shipper to receiver; it is then disposed; see Expendable Pallet

SINGLE-WING PALLET - A pallet with the top deckboards extending beyond the edges of the stringers or stringer-boards with the bottom deckboards flush (if present)

SKID - A pallet having no bottom deck

SLAVE PALLET - Pallet, platform or single, thick panel used as a support base for a palletized load in rack-storage facilities or production systems

SOLID DECK PALLET - A pallet constructed with no spacing between deckboards

STEVEDORE PALLET - A pallet designed for use on seaport shipping docks, normally of heavy-duty, double-wing construction

STRINGER PALLET- A Stringer is a continuous, longitudinal, solid or notched beam-component of the pallet used to support and space the deck components, often identified by location as the outside, interior, or center stringer; bearer; runner.

TAKE-IT-OR-LEAVE-IT PALLET - A pallet fitted with fixed cleats on the top deckboards to permit fork truck tines to pass beneath the unit load and remove it from the pallet

WAREHOUSE PALLET - A double-face multiple trip returnable pallet intended for general warehouse use