B&M Associates, based in Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire, is one of the UK’s longest established pallet management companies. The business started in 1990 with a single client, and now tracks over 10 million pallet movements per annum throughout Europe for clients from hauliers to major blue chip companies, with a proven track record in cost reduction and control.
B&M manages and controls a wide variety of returnable equipment, specialising in management of customers’ pooled pallets from Chep and LPR and their associated systems. B&M’s staff are dedicated to running specific accounts on a day-to-day basis, using a bespoke control system maintained in-house to allow adjustments to be made to clients’ requirements. B&M provide significant cost savings within the client’s pallet pool budgets and are constantly striving to improve these savings by the introduction of new best practice procedures and reporting methods, to continue to provide a value for money service. Simon Blair, Director of B&M Associates, spoke to Warehouse & Logistics News.
Warehouse & Logistics News – Simon, what services do you offer?
B&M Associates offer a wide variety of pallet-related services on a consultancy or on-going basis. These range from one-off assessments of company pallet management practice, through to partial pallet management supporting the client team, to a fully outsourced pallet management and control service. Although we specialise in managing and controlling pallets from pools such as Chep and LPR for our customers, our internally managed and designed bespoke systems can be adapted to control any form of returnable equipment, such as IBC’s, pallecons, display units and any other client specific units to help resolve the common problems. Our main services are pallet management control, assessment, pallet investigation, outsourcing and training and can be tailored to suit the customers’ specific requirements.
WLN – Do you have other offices in the UK besides Melton Mowbray? Do you have offices overseas?
No, we only have the one office in Melton Mowbray but we regularly travel the country to visit our clients and their sites. As our systems are created around each client, we can receive the data we need to control and manage their pools in any format, whether a stack of paper in the post, faxed documents, SAP, WMS or system extracts or Excel spreadsheets, allowing us to manage the account in one central location. Our systems are also set up for remote access so our account managers can access any information they need from outside the office.
We do not have offices overseas but we do work with clients in Europe and have a European Account Manager, who is based in Melton Mowbray but is almost continually travelling around Europe to ensure our clients’ needs are met. Following our recent growth in both the UK and Europe we are now looking at other office options in both areas.
WLN – What are the signs that a company’s pallet management system needs improving?
When you are managing or controlling a pallet pool, there are a number of issues that invariably seem to occur, irrespective of the size and type of business you operate. If you say yes to any of the following questions, you may wish to contact us! Are you being charged for more pallets than you can account for? Have you received large additional invoices for write-off costs following an audit? Have you been charged Lost Equipment Fees? Have you been charged Late Declaration Fees? Do you find the invoices long-winded and confusing? Do you have difficulty in reconciling pallet movements against the invoice?
WLN – What does your pallet management control service cover?
All businesses that use hired pallets from the likes of Chep and LPR or similar equipment pools, need some form of management control in place, either internally or externally, to ensure they stay in control. Here at B&M we have a dedicated team to manage and track each client’s pallet movements and have managed to save a number of our clients substantial amounts of money through good management and best practice, on both a consultancy and on-going basis.
WLN – What kind of cash savings do you achieve for your clients?
The savings we can make rely heavily on the size of equipment pool that needs to be managed and controlled, but we have seen savings of around 40% to 50% of pallet spends on new clients that outsource to us. Clients with large pools can generally see our service fee and more paid back in under 12 months, but these savings are not just on new clients. With our continued review of all options open to our clients for their equipment usage, we strive to make savings at every opportunity to ensure our clients are paying the minimal amount required to still achieve their targets. Last year alone we saved over £1m for our clients, almost half of it for one client with whom we have worked for a number of years.
WLN – How many equipment pools do you currently manage, and what kinds of businesses are they?
We currently manage a number of blue chip companies with over 20 individual pallet and equipment pools, varying from 50,000 movements a year to 2.5 million. We deal predominantly with manufacturing companies, but we also work with hauliers and have recently installed a bespoke pallet management system into a haulier, which they operate and we maintain.
WLN – Large companies have many different delivery and collection points dispersed across large geographical areas and different countries. Presumably you track quantity pallet movements rather than individual pallets, based on numbers that are advised?
Absolutely. Clients send us their information in whatever format suits them, and we upload it into our system and track the pallets by quantity and destination. When we analyse and reconcile the pallet pool provider’s invoice we review all individual items, such as price, pallet type and date of transaction.
WLN – What do you charge for your services?
All our services are charged on an individual basis and are client-specific, like our systems. We have to do this, as each client will have different complexities and data formats to take into account. Although we could be seen as an on-cost to what is already an expensive part of any business, the fees incurred in using our services are significantly outweighed by the benefits of putting our suggestions and procedures into place.
WLN – Established companies presumably have pallet control systems in place, which work well for the most part. How can you help them raise their game to an accepted level of efficiency?
We can provide a one-off pallet control assessment. The main objectives would be to assess the client’s current pallet operations and report back the areas that require urgent attention. This process would include: a review of your current operational structure and pallet flows; a review of your current control methods to highlight high risk areas; a review of current physical stock holding plus third party balances; a review of current unnecessary spends to highlight potential cost savings; a report to highlight recommendations and best practices going forward.
WLN – You say you ‘highlight recommendations’ to clients. Have you ever had to tell a client that your assessment suggests a senior manager is not performing?
It is always difficult to specifically highlight that one particular person is not performing, as we generally find that pallets are an ad-hoc job that someone is given on top of their normal duties, and as long as nothing appears to be wrong they will continue to give pallets a low priority.
It is only when a big bill for lost pallets lands on your desk that you realise you have a problem, proving that when it comes to pallet management, if you have control it doesn’t mean you are in control.
WLN – What does a pallet investigation project entail?
It’s much the same as a Pallet Control Assessment, but with more forensic investigation, including site visits to relevant locations, investigating pallet pool costs for the last 12 months, examining pallet pool providers’ invoices line by line for the same period; investigating physical movement data versus movements declared/invoiced; third party performance investigation; investigation of resource levels and costs. Due to the extra complexity of this project, this can take anything from four to eight weeks to complete.
WLN – What happens when someone outsources their pallet management to you?
This involves B&M running the whole pallet management process on behalf of the client, including all pallet movements in and out of every area the clients’ pallets come from or go to. We start with a pallet investigation project to assess the requirement and set up an operating system to suit the client’s operations. Each of our clients is assigned an experienced account manager dedicated to their account, who will gain an in-depth knowledge of all areas of that account. Data flows are established and all the data gathered to obtain a theoretical stock can then be compared to a physical stock through regular audits to ensure data flow is accurate and there are no surprises for official pallet pool providers’ audits. Although the management and control of pallet pools can be a very difficult task, here at B&M we have many years’ experience in this field. The added value of people outsourcing to B&M will give specific detailed reporting methods, tighter controls and a tailored service with expert advice gained from our experiences over time.
WLN – Who conducts your audits?
Our audit team is made up of the account managers, directors and owners of the business, so they are all from a pallet management background. We believe it is our responsibility to ensure the accounts are running as well as possible, and therefore do the audits ourselves so we are happy with everything.
WLN – If clients have mixed feelings about outsourcing their pallets to you, how do you persuade them it’s for the best?
Outsourcing involves conversations at all levels of the company, to ensure that everyone on the client side is fully satisfied that we will help them achieve at least the same performance levels as before, if not higher. We pride ourselves on knowing where all your pallets are all the time, and we are 100% focused on pallets and their management and control so our clients can concentrate on other areas of their business. Having said that, if following our initial review we felt outsourcing their pallet management to us was not the best option for the client, we would tell them so.
WLN – How long does a newly outsourced account take to go live? What kind of reporting do you offer to outsourced clients?
This depends on the complexity of the account, but we are generally ready to go live with new clients at any time. We do have to create their loop and systems internally but the process of gathering data, visiting sites and preparing our internal processes can be switched on immediately.
Historical summary reports can be issued within a few weeks following data collection, and this then forms the basis for our reports going forwards. These reports can be issued weekly or monthly and can include a full breakdown of where all your pallets are, both on a summary and detailed level; KPI information that can track costs against budgets; current performance against forecasted; year on year comparisons; and trend tracking. As our systems are bespoke and written in-house, and we hold all the client pallet movement data, we are able to create any form of report required by the client, making the full package as flexible as the client wants.
WLN – What do you see as the key external factors which are likely to impact on your business? How important a factor is the recession?
Our biggest worry would have to be technology. With developments in RFID making equipment steadily cheaper to invest in, there may come a time when pallets will be able to be automatically tracked with systems. Having said that, this could still be some time off due to the investment required on the part of the pool provider and our clients. I know, following my experience in projects in this area, that it is not an easy fix at this moment in time and could still lead to gaps in the supply chain process, so we will be around for some time to come.
As far as the recession goes, we have seen a steady increase in business. This can be put down to clients looking at all areas to cut costs and utilising our experience and reputation in the field to review their current processes. We believe we can help any number of businesses look at their current expenditure on pallets and help them reduce it to cut their current costs.
WLN – Finally, where do you see B&M Associates going from here?
I can only see B&M moving onwards and upwards. B&M has grown steadily over the past few years and we have recently moved offices to accommodate this, and also to give my colleagues a more pleasant working environment. We are investing heavily in system hardware and software development, as well as key skilled personnel to help us move forward. With the new business enquiries we currently have and the investment we are making in the business, this means that the next 12 months look like being a very exciting time at B&M. We were established 19 years ago with one client and we still manage that client to this date, so I think we have proved we can provide a great service at a reasonable cost with a strong reputation, a winning combination for a successful company.
B&M Associates tel: 01664 823600 www.bmpallets.com
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