With the freight my factory sends me they use excelsior for dunnage. Excelsior is the “grass” used with Easter baskets. Ours isn’t decorative, it’s a soft yellow color. Back in around 2006 I ran out of the excelsior and was in dire straits. I cannot use styrofoam peanuts or bubble wrap because my product is dense and heavy it crushes that stuff. To give you an idea, I regularly put 65lbs in a 12x12x12 and 16lbs in a 6x6x6. Plus, one of my best customers does not allow peanuts to be used as dunnage.

I spent a week scouring Google looking for the excelsior in the states but could not find it. I even asked the Germans but they didn’t respond. I knew of perforated cardboard and knew it worked well for my purpose. So I purchased the smallest cardboard perforating machine I could for I believe 3500.00. I began getting cardboard from my local recycle center out of their cardboard dumpsters. But after a while, they no longer allow dumpster diving due to liability. They offered to dig it out for me but what took me 10 minutes in the past was now taking 45 minutes. I finally asked the gas station owner in front of our business if he had spare and he said yes and that I could collect on Tuesdays and Fridays.

All was going good till now. The gas station owner hired new people and my cardboard isn’t there when I was expecting it, and I ran out of both cardboard and excelsior. I asked the wife to visit local big churches (they always have a cardboard drop off bin) to collect some for me. She visits a new recycling center we have and they said they have bales of cardboard that weight between 1000 and 1500 pounds, that they receive $150 for. If I give them a donation of $200 we will give you one and load it on your truck for you. Problem solved big time! I rent a truck and pick one up. I thought they would be bales on pallets but they are only bales so I had to unload it the hard way, by hand.

As soon as I begin going through the mess I realize my cardboard perforator can only chew though single and double walled cardboard. The cardboard compacting machine at the recycle center crushed the cardboard in a way making most of it is unusable.

I visited my fabrication shop guy a while back about him taking over my inventory, assembly and logistics. In our conversation he asked about dunnage and told him excelsior and cardboard. He said they wouldn’t work for him, he had to have a constant stream that came to him. When he said this I thought about a machine I’d seen that takes a few sheets of paper off rolls and crimps them into a sturdy yet malleable dunnage. I considered getting one of these machines when I was in dire straits, but decided against it since I didn't know it as well as perforated cardboard and they lease you the machine - you cannot buy one. I have since learned that the paper machine makes a good dunnage.

There I was last weekend for four hours sifting through 1200 lbs of cardboard - most of which I couldn’t use. And I still have many more hours to work with it. A rap song came to mind where he sings about “levels to this stuff” ... only he doesn’t use the word stuff. I started thinking, maybe as the owner of a successful business I should just pay whatever it costs to have the paper crimping machine, maybe I can even write off the expense of having it? Maybe the fab shop guy understands a value I don’t? Maybe what I was doing is what someone starting out does? Maybe I need to recognize, live and work on the correct level.