How to audit a supplier's grading claims without being a specialist
A sampling method a receiving clerk can run in twenty minutes that tells you whether the grade you paid for is the grade you got, with the arithmetic to make it defensible.
By Marisol Vega, Grading line lead · 7 min read · Published February 11, 2025
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Tell us what you have or what you need. A real person in Houston reads every one of these — usually within a couple of hours during dock time.
- Sample properly
- Run the six points on each sampled box
- Score it against what you ordered
- Distinguish grading failures from transit failures
- Raise it usefully
- What a good supplier does next
Pull a random sample of about 10% of a delivered lot, run the six-point inspection on each box, and record pass/fail against the grade you ordered. A conforming Grade A lot should show 95% or better; below 90% is a legitimate rejection. Photograph every failure with the pallet visible.
- Category
- Buying
- Published
- February 11, 2025
- Written by
- Marisol Vega, grading line lead
We publish our grading criteria specifically so customers can check us. Here is how to do that properly, because a vague sense that a load 'looked rough' is not something either side can act on.
Sample properly
Do not inspect the boxes on the outside of the stack. Those are the ones a careless supplier puts there deliberately, and the ones a careful supplier damaged in transit. Both are unrepresentative.
- Pick pallets at random, not the closest ones. If there are ten pallets, inspect from at least three.
- Within a pallet, pull from the middle courses as well as the top.
- Target about 10% of the lot, minimum 20 boxes. Below 20 the arithmetic is not meaningful.
- Do it before anything is put away. Once a lot is dispersed into your operation, you cannot claim anything.
Run the six points on each sampled box
Stand it up empty on a flat surface, flaps open. If it will not stand on its own, that is a fail before you check anything else.
- Corners — hand down all four verticals. Softness, rounding or delamination is a fail.
- Bottom seam — from underneath. Intact glue or staples, no bulge, no separation.
- Walls — raking light across each panel. Crush shows as a shadow line. Count cuts and patches.
- Flaps — all four present, folding at the score.
- Moisture — palm flat inside the wall. Look for the tide line, not just damp.
- Odour — head in the box.
Ninety seconds a box once it is muscle memory. A twenty-box sample is half an hour including paperwork.
Score it against what you ordered
| Ordered | Conforming means | Fail rate that matters |
|---|---|---|
| Grade A | No cuts, no patches, square, dry, no odour | Above 5% is a conversation; above 10% is a rejection |
| Grade B | Max two glued patches, corners sound, dry | Above 10% is a conversation; above 15% is a rejection |
| Grade C | Multiple repairs but self-standing | Above 20% non-standing is a rejection |
Those thresholds acknowledge reality: used goods have variance, transit adds damage, and a perfect lot does not exist. A supplier who cannot hit 95% on Grade A is either grading loosely or shipping carelessly, and the difference matters for how you fix it.
Distinguish grading failures from transit failures
This matters because the remedy differs. Grading failures are scattered and intrinsic: soft corners, old repairs, tide lines, odour. Transit failures are directional and clustered: crush at the nose or the doors, tine marks, a whole course flattened.
If the pattern is transit, the conversation is about securement — banding, load bars, void fill — and it is fixable in one load. If the pattern is grading, the conversation is about standards, and it is a longer one.
Raise it usefully
- Within the window your spec allows — five business days is normal, and it should be in your PO.
- With the sample size, the method and the fail count, not an impression.
- With photographs in situ.
- With a proposed remedy: re-grade, replace, or credit. Naming one moves things faster than asking what they intend to do.
What a good supplier does next
Asks for the photos, agrees a remedy quickly, and tells you what they are changing. What a supplier should not do is explain that used boxes vary. Of course they vary — that is exactly why they published a standard, and the standard is what you are measuring against.
We have been on the receiving end of this and got it wrong twice in three years. Both times the customer's sampling was better than our line's judgement that day. That is what the process is for.
- ECT
- Edge Crush Test. Pounds per linear inch a board edge withstands before buckling. The best single predictor of stacking performance.
- Grade (box)
- A condition classification for used boxes. 1A new, A one clean use, B up to two repairs, C multiple repairs, then scrap.
- Self-standing
- A box that holds its own shape empty. The first and fastest test of whether a box is still usable.
- Tide line
- A wavy discoloured band showing a box stood in water. Permanent strength loss even after drying.
Marisol Vega — Grading line lead
Written on the yard at 1050 E Richey Rd, Houston. Everyone who writes here works the grading line, the baler, the routes or the quote desk — there are no guest posts and nothing on this blog is syndicated.