Sell us your pallets and get your dock back

Four things set the price: the footprint, the condition, how many you have, and how far the trailer drives. Nothing else matters much. The table below is what we actually pay in the Denver metro — it moves with lumber prices, so treat it as a working range rather than a price list.

For sites that generate pallets continuously — grocery DCs, 3PLs, breweries — a standing route is far better than ad-hoc calls. We agree a cadence, leave a trailer, and swap it when it is full. You never think about it again.

Nothing here is compulsory, and we will still buy your pallets if you do none of it. But each of these things removes labour from our end, and we pass most of that back.

• Sort by footprint. Even rough separation between 48x40 and everything else can add a dollar a unit.
• Stack them square. Leaning stacks slow loading and increase damage in transit.
• Keep them dry. Wet wood is heavy, stains, and can grow mould that makes a load unsellable. A tarp is cheap.
• Pull the obvious write-offs. Not to discard — we buy those too — just so the count is honest.
• Tell us about contamination. Chemical spills, food residue, fire or flood damage change what we can legally take.
• Give realistic dock hours. A driver who arrives at the wrong time costs both of us a slot.

There is a printable version of this on our pallet buyback checklist, and a longer explanation in how to sell used pallets.

A buyback offer is really a prediction about how a load will grade when it reaches the sort line. Here is what the grader is actually deciding, so you can predict it too.

How the offer is built

We estimate the mix — what share of the load will land in each row above — from your description and photographs, then apply the rate for each. That is why a photograph is worth so much more than a paragraph: it moves the estimate from a guess to an observation.

If the actual mix differs materially from the estimate, we contact you before processing rather than after. That has happened perhaps a dozen times in three years, and in most of them the load graded better than expected.

If your site produces pallets every week, ad-hoc collection is the wrong model. It creates a recurring scheduling conversation, it lets accumulation build to the point where it becomes a fire-code question, and it prices worse.

Selling used pallets is a straightforward sale of goods, but several customers have needed to explain it to a finance team or an auditor. This is what we provide without being asked.

• A purchase confirmation stating the agreed rate per grade before collection.
• A counted and photographed deck count at the yard, or a signed ticket at loading if you prefer.
• A self-billed invoice or your own invoice, whichever your process needs.
• ACH remittance with the batch reference on it, typically within five business days.
• A Pallet Passport batch record with weights, disposition split and avoided CO₂e for your own reporting.
• A W-9 and certificate of insurance on request, usually returned the same day.

On revenue recognition

For most customers pallet buyback appears as miscellaneous income or as a credit against waste disposal, and either is defensible. If your accounting treats packaging as an asset rather than a consumable, tell us and we will structure the documentation to match — it costs us nothing and saves you an argument.