10 ways Wood Mulch Benefits the Environment

May 17th, 2012

 


Valley Box wood scrap becomes wood mulch, which is shredded wood placed onto disturbed soils. Wood mulching protects bare soil and offers these benefits: o prevent loss of water from the soil by evaporation.

  1. Reduce the growth of weeds, when the mulch material itself is weed-free and applied deeply enough to prevent weed germination or to smother existing weeds.
  2. Keep the soil cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter, thus maintaining a more even soil temperature.
  3. Prevent soil splashing, which not only stops erosion but keeps soil-borne diseases from splashing up onto the plants.
  4. Organic mulches can improve the soil structure. As the mulch decays, the material becomes topsoil. Decaying mulch also adds nutrients to the soil.
  5. Prevent crusting of the soil surface, thus improving the absorption and movement of water into the soil.
  6. Prevent the trunks of trees and shrubs from damage by lawn equipment.
  7. Help prevent soil compaction.
  8. Can add to the beauty of the landscape by providing a cover of uniform color and interesting texture to the surface.
  9. Plants have more roots than plants that are not mulched, because mulched plants will produce additional roots in the mulch that surrounds them.

Mulching is one of the most important ways to maintain a healthy plant. It was natures idea first, and we’re just supporting it. Valley Box chooses to incorporate sustainable business practices by recycling all wood scrap with San Diego’s Waste Management Company. Visit our “Green Thinking”" page to learn more!

 

Download our Wood Scrap Recycling Sheet

Valley Box Company Inc.
http://ValleyBox.com
866-449-2882
Contact Now


Packaging Review: Evaluate

May 1st, 2012

At the end of the packages lifecycle, when you evaluate the performance of the packaging, it may lead to a redesign consideration for continued improvement. That’s why this lifecycle is a circle. With emerging technologies every year, you will always have a chance to improve upon your packaging design.

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If you’re looking to decrease your packaging costs or improve performance, this is your stage in the lifecycle. Your packaging supplier will be an advocate for cost comparisons of similar products or improving performance with a re-design.

For more effective communication, have ongoing reviews which provide a benchmark for evaluations of safety, performance, alternative packaging solutions and cost savings

Provide your packaging supplier with drawings, pictures and dimensions of your product to ensure ongoing success and savings.

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Some final tips about packaging suppliers;

  • Perform your due diligence by always getting at least 3 competitive quotes.
  • When evaluating your packaging costs weigh factors like; Damage Costs, Packing Labor costs, and Re-usablity savings.
  • Communicate successful and damaged shipments for review.
  • With damage claims it’s helpful to supply pictures of packaged products
  • When in doubt install damage indicators to rule out mishandling.
  • Evaluate Packaging company’s not only their price but their Quality, Efficiency, and level of Customer Service.

Valley Box Company Inc.
http://ValleyBox.com
866-449-2882
Contact Now


Environmental Focus on Reusable & Recyclable Packaging

April 17th, 2012

It’s nearly impossible to think of packaging without of its effects on the environment..
 

The packaging industry is very dynamic and has undergone a great deal of change because the universe in which it works is changing. Laws and regulations, new products, the globalization of technologies, and a general increase in competitiveness have accelerated in the last 10 years. Environmentalism has played a large role for several decades and continues to produce new things.
 

The idea of rationing energy use or carbon dioxide production has increased from a possibility to a probability, which will have a direct effect on packaging.
 

More broadly, there’s a movement in society that has a new slogan called sustainability. Packaging is going to have to satisfy a consumer market and a business market that packaging is part of the sustainability cycle.
 

Learn More at http://www.sustainablepackaging.org/
Visit our “Green Business” page to learn more about our efforts in sustainable packaging

Valley Box Company Inc.
http://ValleyBox.com
866-449-2882
Contact Now


Small Business Plants Trees to Celebrate Earth Day

April 9th, 2012

In celebration of Earth Day Valley Box Company partnered with The San Diego River Park Foundation to plant trees native to the Peutz Creek Preserve. Planting trees within the San Diego River watershed will encourage a healthier ecosystem and provide wildfire restoration efforts. During this event, volunteers from the two agencies work together to plant and water Coast Live Oak Trees.

“Valley Box wants to enhance the quality of life in San Diego thru stewardship of the natural ecosystem. To plant trees in recognition of Earth Day around our community not only beautifies the natural landscape, but will moderate the climate, improve the air quality, conserve water, and harbor wildlife!” explains Alicia Eschwege, Marketing Director for Valley Box Company. “Valley Box’s wood containers, built with sustainably grown forests in the USA, were the inspiration to plant trees.” This year Valley Box has donated eight Coast Live Oak trees to the foundation’s efforts to plant trees.

About the San Diego River Park Foundation
The San Diego River Park Foundation (SDRPF) is a community-based non-profit founded in 2001. SDRPF relies upon donations and support from the community and grants for its general operations. The members are dedicated to creating a river-long system of parks, open spaces, and community places that celebrate the River’s unique natural and cultural legacy and enhance our quality of life.

San Diego River Park Foundation current programs include:
Donations – Use paypal to donate to the: General Support, River Conservation Opportunities Fund, Discover Center at Grant Park, Tree planting, and Education Fund.
Volunteer – Visit the event calendar for more dates. Types of events: River Clean-Ups, Outreach and Education, Murals and Community Enhancement Projects, River Monitoring, River Garden, Point Loma Garden, Friends of Santee’s River Park, and Friends of the River Mouth River.
Rescue Team – The first and third Wednesday each month volunteers are needed to help clean up trash sites along the river.

About Valley Box Company
San Diego’s leading packaging manufacturer, Valley Box Co., provides comprehensive package design for today’s industrial packaging challenges. Valley Box provides its customers with packaging solutions that include: custom design, manufacturing, and just in time fulfillment. Visit our Green Business section of our website to learn more.

Download our Green Business Packet
green business

For more information about the San Diego River Park Foundation:
Visit: http://www.sandiegoriver.org/
Call: 619-297-7380
Email: info@SanDiegoRiver.org

 

 


Supporting Local High School Sports

April 5th, 2012

Valley Box is proud to support Sports Boosters 2012 San Diego Baseball Guide, enriching the lives of student athletes. The Sports Boosters mission is simple “to help High Schools throughout the country significantly supplement their athletic/activities budgets”.


Organized sports are an essential tool for children to learn, grow, and prepare for life. Children, who probably don’t yet realize the mental and physical discipline they’ll endure with gritted teeth that, will be better prepared to become citizens and leaders of our communities. High School is a proving ground fraught with all sorts of difficulties, from raging hormones and peer pressure to the searing uncertainty of a world that seldom offers our sons and daughters a clear or hopeful path into the future. One only needs to turn on any of the dozen or so “all sports channels” for a moment to understand that the banner of winning at all cost is flying high. Winning is certainly more fun than losing, but the willingness and the ability to instill in young athletes the true value of simply doing their best under any circumstances is the rarest and most valuable lesson. The legendary Vince Lombardi once said, “Winning isn’t everything, but the will to win is everything.” When a single student athlete is instilled with this principle then a positive impact is made to the team, their school, their community and our society. And ultimately isn’t that the primary purpose of High School athletics?

 

Sports Boosters Inc encourages the “TEAM” because Together Everyone Achieves More. To learn more about Sports Boosters Inc visit their website

Contact information:
info@sportsboosters.net
800-480-5571
3666 Kearny Villa Rd. Suite 305 San Diego, California 92123


Packaging Review: Destination Unpack

April 1st, 2012


Now the product has reached its destination, the time to unpack has arrived.

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Consider the end recipient’s handling abilities:

What are their Lifting capabilities?
Do they have a crane, forklift, lift gate, or hand truck on site for safe unloading?
Can the package be opened safely?
Are there Outside dimension restrictions, for instance is the package passing through a standard entry way or door jamb?
What is the Man power required to safely acess the part?

Your packaging vendor should always consider if the end destination has handling challenges like these.

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This particular Aircraft Manufacturer had a receiving challenge. In this situation the end user had no mechanical equipment on the receiving end and needed to safely acess the wings by hand using two people.

Valley Box developed an ergonomically designed 3-section lid with drop-down sides in order for two people of average height to lift the wing out without damage or injury.
Valley Box Company Inc.

http://ValleyBox.com

866-449-2882
Contact Now

 

 


How to: Turn Scrap Materials into New Resources

March 17th, 2012

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Valley Box Company incorporate sustainable business practices into our operations by recycling all wood scrap using Waste Management’s commercial recycling services. The goal with every recycling program is to retain as much value as possible. WM helps to do that by turning our materials into new resources. The list below describes options to turn wood scrap materials into new resources:  
 

  1. LUMBER: A desirable option for wood waste management would be to reuse the structural or architectural elements, which include casings, banisters, and molding. Large timbers from older or unique structures can be salvaged and reused as structural elements in new buildings. If lumber is reused as a structural element, it must be re-certified by a lumber grading inspector.
  2.  

  3. ENGINEERED WOOD PRODUCTS: Another desirable option for wood waste is feedstock for engineered wood. Engineered wood is the term given to material derived from smaller pieces of wood that are bound together through a variety of glues, resins, and other chemicals to make a wood-like product. Examples of engineered wood include oriented strand board, Particle board, glued-laminated timber, laminated lumber, wood I-joists, and finger-jointed studs.
  4.  

  5. MULCH OR COMPOST:  Feedstock Chipped wood and bark are common mulches. Wood is an excellent bulking agent for composting, although a nitrogen source usually needs to be added.
  6.  

  7. BIOMASS FUEL: Oven dry wood can be converted to liquid or gaseous fuel. In addition, different forms of solid fuel such as charcoal are possible. Industrial wood residues are commonly used for boiler fuel.
  8.  

  9. MISCELLANEOUS USES: Other uses for waste wood include alternative daily landfill cover, animal bedding, wood flour filler for plastic products, and a source of biofuels and chemicals.

 
Recycling wood benefits us environmentally in the conservation of natural resources, and with landfill cost and space savings. Valley Box chooses to incorporate sustainable business practices by recycling all wood scrap with San Diego’s Waste Management Company.  Visit our “Green Thinking”" page to learn more!

Download our Wood Scrap Recycling Sheet
 

Valley Box Company Inc.

http://ValleyBox.com

866-449-2882
Contact Now


Certified Small Business Enterprise (SBE)

March 16th, 2012

Valley Bow is proud to announce we are an approved Small Business Enterprise (SBE) with The Network, by passing our evaluation of the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes.  This certification is recognized by the following agencies:

  • The Port of Long Beach*
  • San Diego County Water Authority*

* There are currently six agencies participating in The Network; however, at the present time, only the Port of Long Beach and San Diego County Water Authority are administering a Small Business Enterprise (SBE) Program.

 

The SBE/VSBE Program was established in October 2004, via an SBE Ordinance by the Board of Harbor Commissioners. The program was designed to ensure that small businesses have the opportunity to successfully participate in the Port’s contracts and procurements.

 

The Port of Long Beach’s Small Business Enterprises (SBE)/Very Small Business Enterprises (VSBE) Program was designed to put more Port dollars into the hands of small and very small businesses, through prime contracting, subcontracting, consulting, and procurement opportunities.

 

The Port of Long Beach is one of the world’s busiest seaports, a leading gateway for trade between the United States and Asia. It supports over a million jobs nationally and generates billions of dollars in economic activity each year.

 


Packaging of the Future: Sustainable & Eco-friendly

March 14th, 2012

Sustainable & Eco-friendly

The term “sustainability” is heard throughout businesses everywhere these days. It’s a concept that embraces both environmental and bottom-line business concerns. For product packagers, sustainability means reconciling what can be conflicting goals: minimizing whatever negative impacts their packaging may have on the environment while adequately protecting products during shipping and handling, Packagers today are facing increasing demands for “sustainability” from every direction–– consumers, retailers and non-profit watchdog groups– with few of these groups offering specific guidelines on how to measure it. What’s more, packagers are encouraged to achieve these dual goals while also controlling the costs of packaging to their customers.
One organization that has tried to define sustainability is the Sustainable Packaging Coalition, an industry working group dedicated to transforming packaging into a system that encourages a sustainable flow of materials. This group lists these ideal attributes of sustainable packaging:

  • Beneficial, safe and healthy for individuals and communities throughout its life cycle
  • Meets market criteria for performance and cost. Sourced, manufactured,transported and recycled using renewable energy
  • Maximizes the use of renewable or recycled source materials
  • Manufactured using clean production technologies and best practices
  • Made from materials healthy in all probable end-of-life scenarios
  • Physically designed to optimize materials and energy
  • Effectively recovered and utilized in biological and/or industrial cradle-to-cradle cycles

Download our Sustainable Packaging Sheet

Learn More at http://www.sustainablepackaging.org/
Visit our “Green Business” page to learn more about our efforts in sustainable packaging

 

Valley Box Company Inc.
http://ValleyBox.com
866-449-2882
Contact Now


Tire Changer Rack Case Study

March 12th, 2012

Case Study

CHALLENGE Valley Box Company tackled a material handling fixture challenge for an Aeronautics company by designing a unique Tire Changer that integrates three steps into one; remove a tire from the rim, mount new tire and seal the bead. The customer was most concerned about the fixture accepting multiple sized wheels and that the finished height would be suitable for safe employee operation.

SOLUTION Our design team creatively developed a multi-step solution. During design the overall height of the fixture was built to “waist-level” to take into account safety concerns, safety rails were also installed to prevent other employees from standing to close to the fixture during operation. Easily adjustable plates were added to allow for wheel diameter flexibility on the fly.

 

BENEFITS

  • Reduced labor by 30%
  • Accepts multiple size wheels
  • Streamline: 3 steps into 1
  • Waist level ergonomics
  • Decreases safety concerns

TESTIMONIAL
“This product is so unique! There isn’t another one like it on the market.” Jim Becker

 

Download the case study!

 

Valley Box Company Inc.
http://ValleyBox.com
866-449-2882
Contact Now