Here i am again with another crazy idea that probably won't make me any money!

I took a break from all things scrap for a while. (Ok, i still collected my aluminum cans). I gave up my shop, simply couldn't afford it anymore.

Now that i'm bored, i've been looking for new areas to dive into. I tried cardboard once. Filled up my entire truck bed, only ended with 200 +/- pounds. $2. Not worth it. It was just standard cardboard box material.

I recently had a CEO of a company contact me about cardboard. They just moved their entire company to our state, and have ramped up production. They are producing literally thousands of boxes a day. Heavy wall. NOT normal cardboard. Only way i can explain it, is gaylord thickness cardboard.

I met up with the guy today. With my little digital scale that is always in my truck, the average sized box that they have weighs just over 14 pounds. That's just 1 box. So, that's .14 cents. I explained too him that every box that *i* have to break down, i charge .10 cents. He agreed to that. I explained to him that the amount of time you have you employees spend tearing these boxes down, you could save by spending a dime. Over time, it pays. He agreed and was happy.

Now, i'm stuck. I have no compacter, i have no huge ginormous box to set there. I have no huge trailer to throw the cardboard in. I have my truck, and access to a midsize trailer with 6 ft. walls.

I've thought about renting a Uhaul truck for 1 day, and see how much i can get out and sold.

This is supposed to happen by mid next week. So i have roughly 3 days to talk a buyer into paying me more than .1 cent a pound. I'm hoping that i can have the price bumped up, by explaining that i'll be bringing in mass quantities of material too them. We'll see.

Anyway, just wanted to run this by everyone. I know it's crazy, but a guy has to do something.



(Nice to be back, by the way!)

Good luck with it Hoss

If these are gaylords I'll buy a few off you.

Can you source a roll off and have it set at the location?

i agree with oldude on this, assuming they are bringing in product in the boxes to be either processed or repackaged in some way, and the empty boxes are in good to new condition, it will take a while but i would think you could find a buyer, good luck hoss

In Pittsburgh we have several companies that sell used boxes in good condition. I would check and see if you can resell them.

I love used boxes, $12 Gaylords all day.

I don't know if you did the math but at 14# per box it would take 143 boxes to make a ton. According to your post you'll only get .01 cents per#, thats 20.00 per ton. Now if you can get 1 or two tons a day maybe your buyer will give you a little more per#. These don't sound like gaylords to me, gaylords have false bottoms, you just fold over the flaps on the bottoms and turn it over onto a pallet, yyou don,t have to brake them down. Pluse all the gaylords I've handled wieghed more than 14#. Now if they give you .10 cents per box to brake them down you'll make 34.30 per ton. Good luck, if this is what you try doing I hope it all works out for you.

Cardboard has to be bailed. They don't make uhauls big enough to justify it. My work had an account with a treadmill co. We would load up an old trailer after unboxing the machines before delivery. We delvd the trailer once it was full ourselves. Trailer load brought in less than 200$ a load. (3800 cu ft trailer) uhauls biggest trucks are around 1400 cu ft.

guys he is suppose to be getting 1000's a day, if his scale is right on the 14lbs a box equals $140 for the first 1000, 2000 is 280 a day, i think the moneys there but my concern is loading 28000lbs a day by hand , that would be tough even for a guy named hoss
by the way hoss i know you done figured but if you can get just a 1/10 of a cent raise thats another $14 a thousand

How about a picture of these boxes? If they are all gaylord boxes then call every scrap yard in your area tell them you have reject gaylord boxes and ask how much they would pay for them.