Every Minute Saved Is Money in the Bank
When it comes to materials handling, the fewest steps mean the biggest profits. The old adage: “Handle items only once” has particular importance when it comes to things like pallets, barrels, carpet rolls, and other heavy and awkward items.
For businesses, maximizing productivity while minimizing labor costs is the tried and true formula for increasing profits. The more a business spends on handling an item, the smaller the bottom line. So handling materials as little as possible while still getting them where they need to be is a continual challenge for warehouses, docks, distribution centers, and even retail operations.
Forklift Attachments Increase Lift Potential
Thinking of materials handling as a mathematical equation is often helpful. If you have to move 10 150-lb barrels a distance of 100 yards and it costs you $5 in labor, fuel, and other costs per trip, you could make 10 trips at a cost of $50.
But if you could lift five barrels at a time and make only 2 trips, your add-on costs are reduced to just $10. That’s $40 off your costs that can go directly to the bottom line.
Forklift accessories such as barrel drum attachments that lift multiple barrels or drums simultaneously can often pay for themselves within a few months and then continue to add to the materials handler’s profits moving forward.
Wide Variety of Forklift Attachments
For a lot of traditional, privately owned businesses, the way things have been done forever isn’t just the best way to do things, it’s the only way.
But the owners of these businesses could take a cue from public-traded companies that are under constant pressure from shareholders to increase profits — and sometimes dividends — quarter after quarter. These types of companies need to be lean by design. Management constantly is looking for any possible way to reduce costs, remove unnecessary steps, and any other actions that will boost the bottom line.
This type of innovation and advanced planning often includes getting the most out of the equipment businesses already own, such as lift trucks and other materials handling vehicles.
As the above example illustrates, lifting and moving four barrels is much cheaper than moving one at a time. Similarly, forklift attachments like booms, carpet poles, dumpsters, work platforms, plows, sweepers and other can transform a simple forklift into a multi-use machine that can not only perform multiple tasks but also lift more to cut costs and grow profits.
So what can your business do to reduce steps? The solution could be among the forklift attachments available today from ForkliftAccessories.com.