Values pages are usually a list of adjectives. These are four decisions we actually argue about, written with the price tag attached — because a rule that costs nothing is not a rule.
If we have failed one of these on your order, tell us here and it reaches a person.
Straight to the grading floor at 9869 Meeks Blvd, St. Louis, MO 63132.
Or email sales@reboxesmarket.com. We have no phone line — dimensions and counts survive much better in writing.
Fold a box in the browser, read off the cube and pallet fit, and send the spec straight through.
Baling is easy, immediate and pays today. Repairing is slow, fiddly and pays over nine trips. Whenever those two options compete for the same container, the bench wins. It has cost us money in individual months and made us money in every single year.
What it costs: roughly 2,400 labour hours a year we could have avoided.
Every quote states A, B, C or mixed, with the definition attached. We do not let a cheap number imply a quality we have not promised. If a customer wants a lower price than grade B supports, we offer grade C and say so, rather than quietly shipping worse boxes.
What it costs: deals we lose to suppliers who simply say 'used'.
Reuse margins do not survive being trucked between a sorting site, a repair site and a warehouse. Everything from inbound to outbound happens at Meeks Boulevard. It limits how fast we can grow geographically, and we have decided to accept that limit.
What it costs: three expansion opportunities declined since 2019.
We mark containers and count trips. When the median went from seven to nine we published it. When our 2023 contamination rate got worse, we published that too, in the same statement. A sustainability figure you only share when it flatters you is marketing, not measurement.
What it costs: occasionally, a genuinely awkward quarter.
We had that one for four years. It led to us shipping grade C board to a customer who needed grade A because they insisted on a price. The boxes failed in a rack, nobody was hurt, and we removed the rule the following week. Saying no accurately is a service.
Ordered by how well each point predicts failure under load, not by how obvious it is. The first one is the least visible and the most important.
| # | What is checked | What disqualifies | Downgrades to |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bottom third of the long panel | Soft, fuzzed or delaminated board from tine strikes | Recovery |
| 2 | Vertical corner squareness | Corners bowed outward from over-stuffing | C, or recovery if severe |
| 3 | Liner colour banding | Patchy darkening indicating moisture cycling | Recovery |
| 4 | Flap edge condition | Fuzzed or feathered edges; missing flap corners | C, or bench repair |
| 5 | Score line integrity | Cracked rather than creased folds | C, or bench re-score |
| 6 | Manufacturer's joint | Separated glue line or pulled staples | Bench repair |
| 7 | Interior cleanliness | Residue, dust, previous product traces | C |
| 8 | Print and label residue | Heavy multi-colour print or continuous tape bands | B at best; re-face station |
| 9 | Top edge crush | Crushing on stacked or racked units | Bench reinforcement, else C |
Take these, argue with them, substitute your own. Two have changed because a customer arrived with better data, which is the entire point of publishing them.
| Factor | Value we use | Range in literature | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Virgin corrugated, cradle-to-gate | 1.30 kg CO₂e / kg | 1.1 – 1.6 | Mid estimate; includes inbound freight |
| Recycled-content corrugated | 0.85 kg CO₂e / kg | 0.6 – 1.1 | Varies hugely with mill energy mix |
| Reuse cycle (collect, grade, repair, issue) | 0.215 kg CO₂e / kg | 0.17 – 0.25 | Our own measurement, trailer-allocated |
| Repair-and-reuse cycle | 0.275 kg CO₂e / kg | 0.22 – 0.33 | Adds bench labour and repair board |
| Conversion to honeycomb or dunnage | 0.49 kg CO₂e / kg | 0.4 – 0.6 | Destroys the container, keeps the sheet |
| Recycling to new board | 0.76 kg CO₂e / kg | 0.6 – 0.95 | Consumes one of the fibre's five to seven lives |
| Triple-wall gaylord board weight | 18.5 lb | 17 – 20 | 48 × 40 × 36, no lid |
| Median trips per gaylord | 9 | 4 – 14 observed | Marked-container study, n = 4,200 |
| Trailer packing efficiency | 72% | 65 – 80 | Knocked down and banded |
| Landfill density, loose OCC | 80 lb / yd³ | 50 – 110 | Used for volume-avoided figures |
We deliberately exclude end-of-life recycling credit, carbon stored in the fibre and avoided landfill methane. All three would improve our figures and all three are contested.
Two of these we make and document. One we refuse to make. One we consider close to meaningless.
| Claim | Evidence needed | Strength | Caveat |
|---|---|---|---|
| Recycled content, post-consumer | Mill certificate of analysis | Strong | Percentage varies by mill and by run |
| FSC Recycled | Chain-of-custody certificate | Strong | Requires certified converters at every step |
| SFI Certified Sourcing | Chain-of-custody documentation | Strong | Covers sourcing practice, not recycled content |
| Recyclable | Material composition | Moderate | Depends on local infrastructure; wax and laminate break it |
| Repulpable | Supplier test data | Moderate | Verify with your actual recycler, not the datasheet |
| Reusable | Trips-per-container data | Strong if measured | Meaningless without a trip count behind it |
| Carbon neutral | Offset purchase | Weak | We do not make this claim and are sceptical of those who do |
| 100% diversion | Usually none | Very weak | Ask what they do with wax-coated produce board |
Fill this in and it lands with a grader on the floor at St. Louis, not in a general inbox. One business day, always.