How to count a plastic pallet lot

Stacks or pallets

Nestable pallets sit inside one another, so they are counted in stacks. One supplier lists about 60 to a stack for a light nestable, and 40 to a stack for a heavier-rated one. Rackable and stackable pallets do not nest, so they are counted one by one, or in loaded-stack rows.

Whichever way you count, say so in the form. The sorter has a switch for it: pallets, or stacks with the number per stack.

The tally on the wrap

1. 1

   Mark each stack

   Chalk or tape the count on the wrap of each stack. It reads from a photo.

2. 2

   Tally in fives

   Four strokes and a slash for five. A column of fives is faster to add than a column of ones.

3. 3

   Add the totals

   Add the stacks, then multiply by the pallets in each stack. Write both numbers down.

4. 4

   Split by footprint

   If the lot is mixed, keep a separate tally per size.

A tally sheet

The form fields this guide fills

• Count (quantity)
• Pallet size
• Branding

How this guide ends

Words you will meet

Nest ratio

How many empty pallets fit in the height of one.

Stackable

Loaded pallets can sit on top of each other, up to the static rating.

Pooling

Renting pallets from a company that owns, tracks and collects them instead of buying.

Closed loop

Pallets that travel between known sites and come back, so they are never lost to a downstream user.

One-way pallet

A cheaper pallet shipped with the load and not expected back.

PP

Polypropylene. More rigid than HDPE and better with heat and harsh chemicals; used where rack stiffness matters.

Recycled-content pallet

A pallet moulded partly or wholly from post-industrial or post-consumer resin.

4-way entry

Forks or a jack can enter from all four sides.

Nestable

Empty pallets stack inside one another, cutting empty storage space by up to 75 percent.

Rackable

Rated to sit on rack beams, with a stated racking load.

Fork pocket

Opening in the pallet where the forks go.

Heat treated (HT)

ISPM 15 treatment for wood: core at 56 C for 30 minutes. Not needed for plastic.

FM 4996

FM Approvals standard that rates a pallet as equal to wood in fire tests.

Injection moulding

Pallet made by forcing molten resin into a mould at high pressure.

CP9

A chemical-industry pallet standard, 1140 x 1140 mm.

Welding repair

Plastic is hard to glue, so cracked parts are normally welded.

Who asks, and what they need

Export shippers

Light or low-cost one-way pallets with no ISPM 15 treatment; Euro 1200 x 800 and 1200 x 1000 sizes.

Plants changing packaging or pallet size

Retire a whole stock of one footprint at once; want it sold or ground up, not landfilled.

Plastic recyclers and pallet makers

Buy broken pallets by weight as HDPE or PP feedstock; want clean, sorted, separated by resin and colour.

What the sources say

• A Nelson 48 x 40 x 4.8 in nestable, stackable, rackable polypropylene pallet weighs 18.0 lb with ratings of 10,500 lb static, 3,100 lb dynamic and 2,700 lb racking, and is listed as ISPM 15 exempt. (nelsoncompany.com)
• Rehrig Pacific's 40 x 48 rackable pallet is high-pressure injection molded co-polymer polypropylene, with 540 per 53 ft trailer. (rehrigpacific.com)
• That nestable has a 2.50 in nest increment and 1,260 units per 53 ft trailer. (rehrigpacific.com)
• In December 2011 a Los Angeles County Sheriff task force recovered over $250,000 of illegally obtained plastic pallets, including iGPS pallets, from a plastic recycler. (eponline.com)
• PHS Plastic lists 19 nestable 48 x 40 and other-footprint models with dynamic ratings from 1,102 to 3,500 lb and static ratings from 2,204 to 15,000 lb, so 'nestable' spans light export pallets to heavy-duty stackers. (phsinc.com)
• Cabka says plastic export pallets are exempt from ISPM-15 treatment, that there is no single export size, and that its nestable export designs include extra-lightweight and air-freight versions. (cabka.com)
• Nelson Company defines dynamic capacity as the load a pallet carries in motion, always below static; static as the load at rest and the bottom pallet's limit in a stack; racking as the load across an open rack span, often the lowest and given only for pallets designed for it. (nelsoncompany.com)
• The five states with the largest gross refrigerated warehouse capacity on October 1, 2025 were California (400 million cubic feet), Georgia (304 million), Washington (301 million), Wisconsin (297 million) and Texas (254 million), per USDA NASS. (esmis.nal.usda.gov)
• USDA NASS counted 931 refrigerated warehouses on October 1, 2025: 476 public and 455 private or semiprivate. Public warehouses held 2.46 billion gross cubic feet, 62 percent of the total. (esmis.nal.usda.gov)
• Fastmarkets estimates 3.7 billion pallets were in circulation in the US in 2025, and that annual pallet production rose from about 800 million before the pandemic to nearly one billion afterward. (fastmarkets.com)
• That Nelson model lists about 60 pallets per stack and 1,800 per truck. (nelsoncompany.com)
• Rehrig Pacific offers the standard-duty nestable with recycled content of up to 90 percent in black, and describes it as 100 percent recyclable. (rehrigpacific.com)
• Only pallets designed for unsupported racking carry a racking rating. (nelsoncompany.com)
• PHS lists 48 x 40 stackable plastic pallets with dynamic ratings of 2,500 to 5,000 lb and static ratings of 3,000 to 30,000 lb. (phsinc.com)
• Plastic pallets weigh about 3 to 15 lb when light and up to 300 lb when heavy; a typical GMA wood pallet weighs about 37 lb. (en.wikipedia.org)
• About 500 million pallets are made each year as of 2020, with about 2 billion in use in the US. (en.wikipedia.org)

• PHS Plastic: nestable pallets
• Nelson Company: sell used pallets

Keep reading

• Guides
• Photos buyers want
• Mixed lots
• What a buyer reads
• Sell
• Sort your pile