As someone who has spent time working with forklifts and pallet jacks, working with outsized loads is relatively easy if you take the time and know what you’re doing. However, lacking experience usually means you have to fall back to either strenuous activity or, uh, “creative” solutions to get the job done in time.
Of course we know things like pallet jacks, lifts, and even handcarts not only make the work of moving heavy loads easier but also keeps things safe. With all that on the table, we wanted to take a look at an episode of the office that seemed fitting – Lotto.
The Warehouse Staff goes all in on the lottery, buying a bulk of tickets, and end up winning a considerable sum of money – so much so, the entirety of the staff ends up quitting their jobs and leaving the sales team in a lurch. The sales staff gets a rude awakening when they discover how heavy paper is and the real size of the quantities they are selling.
Phase One: The Reckoning
Jim leads a team from the office – Dwight, Kevin, and Erin – for the task of loading 300 boxes of copy paper into the truck. 300 boxes, 75 per person, easy enough? Dwight and his ego determine he can move the pallet of boxes himself with the nearby forklift. He fires up the forklift and promptly drives the forks through a steel door, getting it stuck and rendering it useless.
Practicality – In theory: 10. In practice: 0. Forklift experience is worth its weight in gold. Or, in this case, 300 boxes of paper.
Phase Two: Kevin
Taking a whole new meaning to “lifting with your back,” Kevin crawls on hands and knees with a case of paper balanced on his back. Guess what? This doesn’t work.
Practicality: 4. I would have granted it a 5 had they balanced and tied the load to Kevin’s back.
Phase 3: Overthinking
“This is literally how they built the pyramids,” Jim says, wondering how the warehouse staff manages to do this every day. “Well, they whipped people, which is helpful,” says Dwight. Meanwhile, the cameraman pans over to the pallet jack sitting idle on the other end of the warehouse.
Practicality: 7. I mean, they built the pyramids without a pallet jack. But brutal taskmasters are a bit antiquated and, probably, not OSHA approved.
Phase 4 – Kevin Pt. 2
Working from a childhood memory where his sisters would butter him up and slide him across the linoleum floor of the kitchen, Kevin greases a path from the pile of boxes to the trick. Even with the obvious hazards, “We’re not going to carry these boxes, so it’s the best idea we have on the table.”
Practicality: 4. Buttering kids may be a good babysitting idea, but in a warehouse grease gets everywhere and it’s a pain in the ass to clean.
Phase 5: Señor Loadenstein
Daryl, the warehouse manager, returns to find his workspace a disaster. Ruined cases of paper are stacked up to serve as a track to the greased luge serving as the conveyor. Jim, afraid of losing face in front of Daryl, tries to shy away from the name he granted the invention: Señor Loadenstein.
“Let me see it,” insists Daryl.
Kevin lays down a fresh layer of grease while Dwight and Jim launch Erin and a half dozen cases down the chute. Surprisingly, the delivery never ships and Dunder Mifflin loses the client.
Practicality: 5 – the best tool is the one that gets the job done, but that client was probably a chore to deal with.
Lucky for you, while the team at Motus Group may give little nicknames to the conveyor systems we design for our clients, none of them involve grease on the floor nor will they upset your facility manager. Give us a call and we can go over the best possible conveyor systems for your plant – whether you’re moving raw materials, finished product, or distributing fuels and resources, we have extensive experience in engineering systems that are practical, efficient, and safe.
Otherwise, you know…