In this article, we will cover how to choose your next warehouse to store pallets. If you are considering taking on a new warehouse, the most obvious question you will be asked by the Board is ‘How much will it cost’. Many revert to the price per square foot, which could appear low, but if the building is only 5m high and you need a building at 10m high, will the cost be the same? Without having lots more detail, we can’t answer that question in this article, but what I can tell you is what further questions you can ask to find out if this is the right warehouse for your requirements. Is it going to be efficient to store your pallets? 

How many Square Feet? 

When deciding to move to a new warehouse the first metric that most companies assess is the footprint of the building, in the UK usually referred to as the square footage (or occasionally square meterage) of the building. This is the total floor space of the building but doesn’t take into account any nooks or crannies, or any areas of the building which may not be useable. If a warehouse has several chambers of different sizes, and heights or if it’s very long and narrow it isn’t going to be space efficient. If it’s a large rectangle of a ratio approx. 4:3 for example, it will be far more efficient. 

How tall is the building?

The second metric is usually the Eaves height, which is usually referred to in meters, and is generally referring to the lowest point of the roof height. This is effectively the uniform useable height of the building. There may be some higher areas, that you can utilise, but this isn’t taken into account at this stage. 

What you also need to know at this stage, is how tall are your pallets going to be (including the pallet itself). We all know that this can vary, but you need to have an idea. For example, are 50% of your pallets 1.5m high, and 50% 1m high, but do you want to be able to store any pallet in any location? If this is the case, you are working with a 1.5m high pallet. You then need to allow for approx. 0.2m additional height, for the thickness of the beam above, and a gap between the top of the pallet, and the bottom of the beam. So, in general terms, you need to allow 1.7m in height for each pallet. Larger buildings may require 1m if roof sprinklers are present. Please look out for our other article on ‘Must I have a sprinkler system for our pallet racking?’ 

So, let’s say, the eaves height for the roof is 9m, divide this by 1.7m, and voila, you can get 5.3 pallets in the height of the building. So, should you be looking for a building with 10.2m in the eaves, which would get you an additional level of pallets – another 20% capacity! 

If you are looking at a building that is 20m high, can you get a fork truck that will go that high, and if so, how much will a fleet cost? 

Structural Column Centres 

This is a less obvious question to most, but as a pallet-racking professional, this is the first thing that I want to know: What are the centres of the structural columns? What does this mean? 

Most warehouses of over 10,000 square feet will have columns within the footprint of the building which is holding the roof up. These are the Structural columns and are usually located in rows and set out at regular intervals. If you have a warehouse with lots of structural columns, and they are at 5m centres, it is going to be very difficult to provide an efficient pallet racking layout. Most modern warehouses have these set out at 16m intervals (centres). This is a tried and tested distance which has been researched intensely over the last 10-20 years, and it has been pretty much agreed that this is the most efficient distance to accommodate pallet racking within the warehouse. Anything other than this could have a significant effect on the number of pallet locations that can be achieved by pallet racking. 

What type of fork truck? 

There have been many advances in fork truck technology over the years, which has made the efficiency of standard pallet racking much higher. Concentrating on aisle widths here (the distance between 2 runs of racking) with the narrower being the most space efficient, here are the 4 main types:- 

Type  Aisle Width Availability  Cost  Lift height  Damage Impact on Racking 
Counter Balance 3-4m Very good Low 3-5m High
Reach 2.7-3.2m Very good Med 8-12m High
Articulated 1.8-2.2m Good Med 8-12m High
VNA 2m Low High 10-15m Low

VNA Fork Trucks 

Different types of fork trucks require different aisle widths between the racking, reach different heights, cost different amounts and potentially have more impact on your racking system. 

20 years ago, it was all about Very Narrow Aisle forklift trucks, commonly referred to as VNA. It was said to be able to get aisle widths down to 1.5 to 1.6m aisles. However, this was when buildings were considered tall at 10m eaves, and buildings were often designed specifically to suit the racking system. Sometimes, these weren’t even fork trucks. They were crane systems supported from the roof of the building, and the costs were astronomical. With advances in modern construction, a warehouse of 15-18m is considered standard, but the laws of physics have not advanced along with them. If you want a forklift truck to lift a heavy pallet to 15m in the air, I can’t be supported by a fork truck that is so narrow. We are now back to a situation where a VNA truck, really needs a 2m aisle width. This happens to fit in well with the 16m column grids as mentioned earlier. VNA trucks require a wire guidance system which has an electrical wire inserted into the centre of the aisle which means that the driver doesn’t need to worry about steering the truck. However, this adds to the overall cost of the fork trucks, and in general terms, it doesn’t work out cost effective to have a VNA truck system in a warehouse of 100,000sq ft or less. 

How good is the floor slab? 

This is another extremely important consideration, which is all too often not taken into consideration until it’s too late. Without going into the mathematical detail, if you are looking at a tall warehouse with heavy pallets that aren’t very tall, all of that weight is transferred down the pallet racking uprights, as a point load to the floor. Think of a point load being a high heel, rather than a flat shoe. If you have got a 12m high building, with 10 levels of pallets, each pallet being 1000kgs (a ton in old money) you will have 9 tons of weight being transferred down each ‘high heel’ Does the floor of this warehouse have that capacity? 

At AlphaStor we have huge levels of experience in the decision-making process for getting the right warehouse for your requirements. We are also fine-tuned is bringing all of this information together to achieve the most cost-effective and most space-efficient layout for your requirements, and we will be happy to work with you to achieve this. 

So – remember:

  1. Structural Column Centres 
  2. Fork Truck Type 
  3. Floor slab 

Please look out for our other articles about pallet racking in your warehouse. And utilise our warehouse services, if you’re in the market and are looking for consultation on a new shed.