How to Ship a Pallet: Your Full Guide to Using Pallets for Hotshot Deliveries

As a business owner, you need to ensure that your products will arrive at their destination safely and securely. In most cases, the best way to safely secure your products is by organizing them on a pallet.

Whether you're shipping goods across town or across the country, pallets will help you save time, cut down on costs, and protect your products from damage. Pallets make it easier to load and unload your products, while helping you maximize storage space to cut down on transportation costs. They also prevent your goods from moving during transit, which ensures they arrive at their destination in good condition.

Let’s take a look at why pallets are important, how to properly secure them, and how much it costs to ship them. 

Utilizing Pallets—Why Proper Pallet Use and Securement Matter

Using a pallet to ship your products can offer several advantages over simply stacking your goods in a trailer. Compared to using a trailer alone, pallets provide increased efficiency and safety. 

In addition to making it easier to load and unload your products, pallets boost efficiency by keeping your products organized during the shipping process. When you stack your goods on a pallet, it’s easier to keep track of your products. This helps you manage your inventory efficiently and reduce the risk of misplacing products. On top of that, organizing your products on a pallet allows you to maximize your cargo space, which helps you keep transportation costs down.

Pallets also keep your products from shifting, which helps keep them safe and free from damage. They’re also particularly beneficial when transporting your goods on an open trailer, as they prevent your goods from falling off the trailer during transit. Pallets are widely recognized as the safest method of shipping goods, and most shipping carriers require the use of pallets to meet safety standards. 

Discover how Open Road is the preferred shipping solution for the retail industry.

How to Secure a Pallet for Shipping

Properly securing a pallet will ensure that you keep your products safe and secure during the shipping process. Although it may seem like a straightforward process, there are a couple key considerations to keep in mind.

First, you want to make sure your pallet is free from damage and can safely hold your products without breaking. After inspecting your pallet, you can start loading your products from heaviest to lightest. As you’re stacking your products, ensure that they’re not hanging over the edge of the pallet, and you’re not stacking them too high. Most of the time, you should keep your pallet under 60 inches high.

Once you’ve safely stacked your products, you should ensure that they can’t shift during transit. To do this, tightly wrap your products in shrink wrap, starting at the bottom and adding several layers up to the top. When securing your pallet to a trailer, especially an open trailer, you should use ratchet straps to prevent your pallet from moving. After loading and securing your pallet, perform a final check to make sure it’s wrapped and strapped down properly.

Read our LTL Packaging Guide to discover how to ensure your LTL cargo arrives safely and securely. 

How Much Does It Cost to Ship a Pallet?—Understanding Price Factors & How to Cut Costs

Shipping a pallet in the United States can cost anywhere from a couple hundred dollars to over a thousand dollars. There are several factors that can affect the cost of shipping pallets, some of which include:

• Weight
• Size
• Shipping distance
• Insurance
• Expedited, overnight, or holiday shipping

The price of shipping a pallet is also dependent on the type of shipping method you choose. Full truckload (FTL) shipping methods allow you to ship a large number of pallets, but are generally more expensive. Less than truckload (LTL) shipping restricts the number of pallets you can ship, but it is generally less expensive. 

Read our related article to discover why LTL rates are changing.

How to Ship a Pallet for Cheap

Fortunately, there are alternatives to traditional shipping methods that can help businesses cut costs on shipping pallets. Certain companies, like Open Road, match independent hotshot truckers with companies that need them.

Hotshot trucking can help businesses save money on shipping costs while ensuring reliable, timely deliveries. With hotshot trucking, business owners don’t have to worry about additional charges for special handling fees, LTL consolidation fees, or high costs for FTL shipping. 

Hotshot trucking also allows for greater flexibility, as they generally offer quicker deliveries, faster turn around times, and customizable shipping solutions. In general, hotshot trucking can be a reliable and cost-effective alternative to traditional shipping methods for transporting pallets.

Open Road—Fast, Reliable, and On-Demand Shipping

Open Road provides simple and smart shipping solutions that help keep your business costs down. We connect you with a network of professional hotshot drivers that ensure your shipments arrive safely and on time. Our easy-to-use app allows you to schedule deliveries, track shipments, and get your products when you need it most.

Sign up for free today to see how Open Road is the small business shipping solution.