Issue link: http://palletcentral.uberflip.com/i/1141207
palletcentral.com PalletCentral • May-June 2019 31 The tour will move on to viewing anti-corrosion protection options including various types of wrapping, vacuum sealing, and preparing products for final packaging. The company has packaged a range of products from small to weighing more than 160,000 pounds and sized bigger than a tractor trailer. "Packaging is often manufactured with fairly complex design content," Trillwood said. "Whether we're designing interior dunnage and cushioning from 3D images supplied by customers or engineering a load-bearing structure, it's done with exacting detail and a high degree of know-how and skill. The designers provide computerized job sheets and drawings for each job. The goal is to impose order and as much standardization onto a very customized type of business." Topax services the freight forwarding industry, makes empty packages for the nuclear, aerospace, and automotive sectors, and for the mining sector, prepares heavy equipment for loading and blocking of sea containers. The company also regularly makes containers for commodities such as steel coils and automotive blanks. "Our business is based on the individual needs of different types of customers shipping goods to a variety of destinations, including multiple trips to subcontractors around southern Ontario or around the world to a remote mine site with many logistical challenges," Trillwood added. Weston Forest Products Also on the tour is Weston Forest Products, one of Canada's leading distributors of softwood, hardwood, and forestry/panel products selling primarily to manufacturing companies. Founded by Frank Ekstein in 1953 as Weston Road Wholesale, the Mississauga- based company now counts facilities across Canada as well as in New York, Michigan, Connecticut, and Alabama. At the Mississauga plant, eight businesses operate there, including pallet and box operations, retail, truss, wholesale, construction, industrial, mill sales, and U.S. commodity trading group operations. At the time of the October tour, "We will have recently completed a renovation of our building including new sales offices, operations, training room, and other areas," said Steven Rustja, Weston's vice president for trading. "Our sales offices are modernized with TV screens that display KPI's, order inquiries and available inventories." While on the tour at Weston, participants will visit the company's onsite milling facility. The visitors will also see a brand new state-of-the-art Weinig resaw as well as the new truck routing software. Rustja added that the company will update visitors "on tariffs and duties and how this will affect lumber shipments to the United States." Pallet Management Group Pallet Management Group was founded in 1987 and has evolved from a wood pallet recycler manufacturing wood pallets to a full- service recycling solutions provider. The company has Ontario locations in Milton (Campbellville) and London (St. Thomas). Fall Tour participants will be visiting the 13-acre Campbellville site; in St. Thomas the company has a 25-acre site. Together the locations total approximately 130,000 pallets in inventory. With more than 30 years in the business, the company prides itself in servicing 85% of the province with its pallet recovery, recycling, and manufacturing operations. With much of Ontario's business being related to the automotive industry, "We currently service, directly or indirectly, what are traditionally known as the Big Three along with two of the largest foreign automotive manufacturers on both sides of the border," said Bob Braun, general manager. Outside of the automotive industry, Braun added that the company "is well-diversified into ever-growing online distribution services, both on the 'sell to' and 'acquisition' sides of the market." The company also owns 135 highway trailers – each measuring 53 feet – along with 15 power units. PMG also has its own in- house IT person who has custom designed a system to management all pallet inventory and related operations. "This produces results that are unique to Pallet Management Topax Protektive Packaging Weston Forest Products