Plastic pallets delivered in Iowa

Pork, eggs and processing rooms

Iowa raises more hogs than any other state and produces more eggs than any other state. Pork plants in Waterloo, Sioux City, Storm Lake, Ottumwa, Marshalltown, Columbus Junction and other towns cut and pack that output, and egg breaking plants turn shell eggs into liquid and dried product.

Liquid egg leaves those plants chilled in totes and lined cartons, and a spill of raw egg on a wood deck is hard to clean out. Egg processors therefore keep plastic in the cooler and on the breaking floor, where a deck can be scrubbed and rinsed.

Packing rooms are washed down with hot water and sanitizer every shift. A wood pallet in that room takes on water, can grow mold and drops splinters, so processors use plastic inside the plant even when wood carries the outbound load.

The usual pick is a solid or closed-deck HDPE pallet with no hollow cavities to trap wash water. HDPE stays tough in blast freezers that sit well below zero. The food-contact status of a given pallet comes from its maker's paperwork; 21 CFR 177.1520 sets the rules for the olefin resin itself.

• Plastic pallets for meat and poultry →
• Food grade plastic pallets →

Interstates across the corn belt

I-80 crosses Iowa from Council Bluffs through Des Moines and Iowa City to Davenport, carrying a large share of the transcontinental truck freight between Chicago and the West. I-35 crosses it at Des Moines, running from Minneapolis to Kansas City. I-29 follows the Missouri River on the western edge through Sioux City and Council Bluffs, and I-380 links Cedar Rapids and Waterloo to I-80.

The Mississippi forms the eastern border, with barge terminals at Dubuque, Davenport, Muscatine and Burlington that ship grain downriver.

Iowa also runs many ethanol and soybean crushing plants in small towns near the grain, and those sites take inbound enzymes, yeast, chemicals and spare parts in drums or totes rather than cases.

Machinery makers and their supplier loops

John Deere builds tractors in Waterloo, construction equipment in Dubuque and sprayers and other machines in Ankeny, and the company's suppliers are spread across eastern Iowa and the Quad Cities. Pella and Vermeer both build in Pella, and HNI makes office furniture in Muscatine.

Heavy parts loops need a pallet with a high dynamic rating and, if parts sit on beams, a published racked load. Ask for the racked figure on the maker's sheet; it is usually the lowest of the three numbers and the one that matters over a rack span.

Davenport also has a large aluminum rolling mill on the river, where coils and sheet packs are far heavier than any grocery load; heavy-duty pallets with steel-reinforced runners are worth asking about there.

• Heavy duty plastic pallets →
• Dynamic, static and racked loads →

Grain processing in Cedar Rapids

Cedar Rapids mills oats and corn on a large scale, with cereal, sweetener and starch plants along the Cedar River. Bagged and boxed product from those plants often moves on 48x40 pallets into grocery distribution. Hy-Vee, the Midwest supermarket chain, is based in West Des Moines and runs its own DCs in the state.

Dry food plants want a pallet that doesn't leave wood fragments in finished goods areas and can be cleaned during sanitation shutdowns.

• Plastic pallets for grocery distribution →

Getting pallets to an Iowa plant

A truckload rides on a 53-foot van, about 52.5 feet long inside. Packing plants and machinery makers often take full loads, and nestable models pack the most pallets per trailer.

LTL serves Des Moines, Cedar Rapids and the Quad Cities on frequent schedules. Plant towns like Storm Lake, Ottumwa or Columbus Junction take longer routing. Many plants have strict receiving windows, so include dock hours and any appointment rules.

Selling worn pallets from Iowa

Packing plants cycle through plastic pallets as decks crack under forklifts and cold. Cracked HDPE still has value as regrind. Send the count, footprint, resin code, condition and pickup ZIP, and we reply with an offer for the pallets or the plastic.

• Cracked and broken plastic pallets →