199,376,616 HECTARES CERTIFIED
33,777 COC CERTIFICATES
1,549 FM / COC CERTIFICATES was how Gerber used the Northern Cape’ s lack of timber to defend his business. Any competitor who wants to copy his business model and match his successes, first must get raw timber to Upington cheaper and build pallets that are better than Gerber’ s prices and quality.
CONTRIBUTORS- TALKING TIMBER
kilometres away. The transport costs and delays to get ready-made pallets to farmers ate into budgets and made planning difficult.
Zak Gerber rethought the process and decided to build pallets, crates and drying racks in Upington. Slashed pallet prices and zero delays were some of the immediate benefits that resulted from this, but the real masterstroke
FSC IN NUMBERS
AS OF 3 APRIL 2018
199,376,616 HECTARES CERTIFIED
33,777 COC CERTIFICATES
1,549 FM / COC CERTIFICATES was how Gerber used the Northern Cape’ s lack of timber to defend his business. Any competitor who wants to copy his business model and match his successes, first must get raw timber to Upington cheaper and build pallets that are better than Gerber’ s prices and quality.
Gerber first got local manufacturing in place and then he secured control of fixed costs of the business, like transport and the price of timber. Gerber controls the transport costs with his own fleet of trucks. To reduce the price of timber as much as possible, he uses a simple approach – to buy in bulk and process as much timber as possible locally.
Timber blocks are easier to transport, cost less than ready sawn material and can be cut into any size that manufacturing requires, which wasn’ t always possible while his factory grew. A single head resaw made some custom cutting possible but the 8mm components used for drying racks still came from timber suppliers. The premium paid for these components was high and ate into Gerber’ s margins.
As a solution, he invested in a Wood-Mizer HR500 resaw, which has decreased the company’ s timber costs and increased its production capacity significantly. In so doing, the company continues to produce the required amounts of timber products to the farming community and cut costs, which benefits both local farmers and the timber industry.
// APRIL / MAY 2018 61