Cheap Pallet Trucks
Posted on | Posted in General
At 17 I was lucky enough to buy my first car and I paid top money. After 2 trouble free years I sold it and bought a newer model at a bargain price. Result – disaster! It spent more time off the road than on it. I’d learnt a valuable lesson – if it looks too good to be true – it probably is!
The price of a ‘standard’ pallet truck now ranges from about £200 to £300 so is there a difference? Most pallet trucks are imported from the Far East but their quality varies. Some are still made in Europe and their quality also varies.
If you need something to move a couple of one ton pallets a day, a cheap pump truck may be OK for you but it’s unlikely that it can be repaired if it starts to leak. A more expensive model is likely to last longer, particularly if its regularly maintained so if you have a fleet it may be worth looking carefully at the options.
Is it manufactured in Europe by a market leader or is it a cheap import with ‘badge engineering? Does it have on-site warranty? If so, how long? Do you want the lowest lifetime cost or simply a cheap price and throw it away when it breaks down?
More and more companies are learning the benefits of paying a little bit more. We now offer 3 years on-site warranty with all the new pallet trucks we supply providing they’re regularly serviced and at £280 for standard sizes, our heavy duty trucks are in the mid-price range.
Of course there will always be people who are seduced by seemingly low prices but in the words of John Ruskin:
“It’s unwise to pay too much, but it’s worse to pay too little. When you pay too much, you lose a little money – that’s all. When you pay too little, you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do. The common law of business balance prohibits paying a little and getting a lot – it can’t be done. If you deal with the lowest bidder, it is well to add something for the risk you run, and if you do that you will have enough to pay for something better.”
I just wish I’d read those words when I was in my teens!