Export pallets and ISPM 15, from the packing line

Chair orders are decided on frame, fabric and finish, and then a shipment is held at the port over a stamp on the side of a pallet. Pallets are the cheapest part of the container and the most common reason one gets stopped, so we treat the specification as part of the order, not as an afterthought.

Published by JPChairs · Chair manufacturer in Foshan, China · 2026-10-25

What ISPM 15 actually asks for

ISPM 15 covers solid wood packaging thicker than 6 mm: pallets, crates, skids, dunnage and any timber used to brace the load. Four things have to be true before a pallet leaves the yard:

• Heat treatment, HT: the core of the wood reaches 56 C and holds it for 30 continuous minutes in a kiln. This is what we use, and it leaves no residue.
• Methyl bromide, MB: still legal in a few destination-specific cases, but it is being phased out and most buyers no longer accept it. Ask before you assume.
• Debarked: remaining bark pieces may not be wider than 3 cm, or if wider than 3 cm the total bark area on a piece must stay under 50 cm2. Inspectors measure this.
• The mark itself: the IPPC wheat symbol, the two letter country code, the treatment provider number and HT or MB. It goes on two opposite faces, it must be permanent and legible, and it may be black since the 2009 revision removed the red ink rule.
• Exempt materials: plywood, particleboard, OSB, presswood moulded pallets and plastic are manufactured and need no treatment or mark at all.

Pallet sizes by destination

The size is a market decision, and changing it after the container plan is drawn costs a day of replanning. These are the four we build to:

• 1200 x 1000 mm: the default for a 40 ft container and the one we use unless told otherwise. Standard build is a 145 x 22 mm top deck, 100 x 100 x 78 mm blocks and a 100 x 22 mm bottom board, weighing 18 to 24 kg in pine.
• 1200 x 800 mm euro: required by most European retail distribution centres and racking. A 40 ft high cube takes 20 of them per tier, two across and ten deep.
• 1219 x 1016 mm (48 x 40 in): the North American GMA standard. Nine deep and two across gives 18 per tier in the same container, so the euro size moves more chairs on the same sailing.
• 1100 x 1100 mm: Japan and parts of Asia. It wastes roughly 300 mm of container width, and hardwood versions run 28 to 35 kg a pallet.

Tell us the pallet size at order placement. It changes the carton count per layer before the cartons are even made.

Weight limits, and where the load sits

Chairs are a volume cargo, not a weight cargo, and the numbers say so:

• Container: a 20 ft general purpose box has about 28,000 kg of payload after a 2,200 kg tare; a 40 ft high cube has about 26,500 kg after a 3,900 kg tare. A full load of 320 restaurant chairs at 6.5 kg each, plus 20 pallets at 22 kg and the cartons, lands near 2,800 kg, which is about 10 per cent of the payload.
• Road: this is what actually binds. US federal limits are 36,287 kg gross, 9,072 kg on a single axle and 15,422 kg on a tandem; the EU drive axle limit is 11,500 kg.
• Distribution rule: no more than 60 per cent of the total weight in any one third of the container length, heavy cartons at the bottom and light ones on top, and the centre of gravity as low as the load allows.
• Orientation: chair cartons travel flat, never on end. Standing a carton on end puts the whole stack load onto the frame tubes and is the single most common cause of corner crush.

How a chair pallet is built

This is the wrap specification on our packing line, and it is worth putting in your purchase order so it is auditable:

• Stretch film: 20 to 23 micron, pre-stretched 200 to 250 per cent, five wraps minimum with 50 per cent overlap. Below four wraps the load shifts on a 200 km road transfer.
• Strapping: PET 16 mm x 0.90 mm, tensioned to 350 to 450 kg, two straps per pallet with a 3 mm edge protector under each one.
• Corner protection: 3 mm paper or 2 mm plastic angle board on all four vertical edges.
• Height: 1,600 mm maximum including the 145 mm pallet, and 100 mm of clearance below the door opening wherever possible.
• Overhang: 30 mm per side at most. At 50 mm the outer cartons start taking the strap load instead of the corner board, and the dents show at destination.
• Interleaving: a 3 mm corrugated sheet every fourth layer when cartons are printed, which stops the scuffing that turns into a 2 per cent rejection rate.

Palletised or floor loaded

Both work, and the choice is about your warehouse rather than about us:

• Yield: floor loading a 40 ft high cube gives 8 to 12 per cent more chairs, about 336 against 300 for a stackable restaurant chair, because you use the full 2,698 mm internal height and lose no pallet footprint.
• Unloading: 40 to 50 minutes with a pallet truck against 2 to 3 hours by hand for a floor loaded box, which at USD 45 an hour for a two man crew is USD 180 to 250 a container.
• Damage: 0.1 to 0.3 per cent palletised against 0.6 to 1.2 per cent floor loaded, measured over our own 2025 shipments.
• Cost: USD 14 to 18 each for a heat-treated 1200 x 1000 mm pine pallet, so USD 280 to 360 for 20 pallets, plus about 8 per cent of the container volume.
• Who decides: several large distribution centres refuse floor loaded containers outright. Check before you optimise the cube.

Our default is palletised, and we switch only when you confirm it in writing. The packing line and the checks behind it are shown on the factory packing lines.

The three marks that have to match

When an inspector opens the container, three things are compared, and a mismatch on any one of them stops the shipment:

• The stamp on two faces of every wooden item, including dunnage and bracing that someone added at the last minute.
• The wood packaging declaration, listing every wood item in the container with its treatment type.
• The pallet count on the packing list, which has to equal what is physically in the box.
• Failure cost: re-export, or on-site treatment at USD 400 to 1,200 plus 3 to 7 days of demurrage at USD 60 to 150 a day. That is USD 600 to 2,200 for a mark that costs USD 4 to 6 per pallet.

Two recurring mistakes: a pallet swapped by a forwarder after inspection, which loses the mark, and a repaired pallet, which needs a fresh mark from a certified repair agency rather than the original one. The questions we are asked most about export packing are answered on the export packing FAQ.