Welcome to the April 1st Warehouse & Logistics News. Spring has now officially started – the vernal equinox was on Thursday 21 March. But as everyone who attended the recent IMHX Show at the NEC will confirm, conditions there were Baltic! Even so, it was a superb event, and congratulations to the organisers and exhibitors for making it so successful. We’ll report on the show in our next issue.

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FrontWhatever the weather’s doing, Warehouse & Logistics News delivers the latest industry news and scheduled features, to help your operation turn in a winning performance all year round. In this issue we look at The Loading Bay Fork Trucks and Storage Solutions. Industrial Doors includes industrial doors, dock levelers and dock lifts. Fork Trucks takes a look at all things fork truck; counterbalance trucks, side loaders, VNA, reach trucks and specialist machines. Storage Solutions looks at maximising the efficient use of warehouse space with the latest storage solutions including pallet racking, cantilever racking and shelving.

Spring is associated in people’s minds with new growth, green shoots and all that malarkey. So it’s good to confirm that there are some signs of new growth in our industry, even if elsewhere it’s bleak.

As reported in this issue the new Manpower Employment Outlook survey shows hiring intentions in the transport sector for quarter two of 2013 have jumped to 17%, 19 percentage points up on last quarter. On the product front, Inka’s new Euro-size pallets featured on our front page have a unit price comparable to pallets with half the capacity, welcome news in terms of cost savings for warehousing and logistics managers in food, pharmaceuticals and electronics and exporters.

From green shoots to green bananas, logistics and supply chain experts Logistics Partners Ltd have been instrumental in launching a new banana brand from Ecuador into the UK wholesale market, as reported in this issue. As Mark O’Sullivan, MD of Logistics Partners points out, customer demand for BanaBay is increasing based on the consistent high quality of the produce, with timely and reliable delivery on the back of effective supply chain management. Dragons Den and The Apprentice focus on the good ideas and creativity in marketing, and the logistics side isn’t usually seen taking the lead.

Finally, if it’s any consolation, Swedish weather watchers define the start of spring as the first occasion on which the average daytime temperature exceeds zero degrees Celsius for seven consecutive days. If our weather stays Scandinavian here, in years to come the Easter break will involve skiing on the hillsides, trekking through the snow to the pub, and enjoying mulled wine with our Easter eggs. Things could be a lot worse!

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