Embalatges Serdà: 3,000 pallets a day without manually moving four metric tons of wood

Making pallets is the most physically demanding job there is: one board after another, all day, every day.

Embalatges Serdà has been in business since 1910 in Castellbell i el Vilar, at the foot of Montserrat, and today the fifth generation of the family runs the company. It automated its production line with Atlas Robots and shared the story on camera in 2018.

Project Overview

Client	Embalatges Serdà, S.L.
Sector	Manufacturing, Repair, and Logistics of Wooden Pallets
Country	Spain (Castellbell i el Vilar, Barcelona)
Cell installed	Plank Palletizer
Startup	2018
Spokesperson	Eudald Simón Serdá

The Starting Point

Before automation, a single person would move about four metric tons of wood a day, piece by piece. That is the true limit of a pallet factory: it isn’t set by the market, but by the back of the person assembling the pallets.

Results

• 3,000 pallets per day manufactured
• 1,800 pallets per day recovered and repaired
• To move 4 metric tons wood per day per person to operate the machine
• Same staff, much higher output

We produce much more with the same number of employees. That same person now operates the machine: they don't have to move even two kilos of wood. Embalatges Serdà

A factory built in 1910, now run by the fifth generation

This is the type of client Atlas targets with its standard solutions: a family-owned business in a mature industry, with tight margins, where investment decisions are made at the plant level rather than by a committee.

The Full Interview

Transcript of the interview

Eudald Simón Serdá, Embalatges Serdà (Castellbell i el Vilar, Barcelona). Transcript slightly edited for readability.

Embalatges Serdà is our family’s long-standing business, a century-old company with more than 100 years of history. My great-great-grandfather founded it in 1910 as a carpentry shop; it later transitioned into packaging, and now we specialize in manufacturing wooden pallets. We’re located right at the foot of Montserrat, in the province of Barcelona, and our children have taken over—they’re the fifth generation currently working in the business.

We've purchased new machines and are now up to date—well, automated. The machines do everything. We produce more with the same number of employees: we haven't cut back, but we produce much more.

To do what we do now, one person used to move four metric tons of wood a day. Piece by piece, two at a time, but by the end of the day, they had moved four metric tons. Now that same person is operating the machine and doesn't have to move even two kilograms of wood.

The system we've just acquired performs a different type of work: inspecting and sorting the recovered pallets. We collect the pallets from our customers, inspect them, repair them, and return them in perfect condition so our customers can reuse them.

We manufacture 3,000 pallets a day and perform maintenance on 1,800. Since we produce so many, the product can be offered at a slightly lower price. Pallets are important because if a company runs out of them, it cannot load, store, or distribute its products. We offer high quality at a good price, thanks to state-of-the-art pallet-manufacturing machinery.

Robots for Pallet Factories

If you manufacture or recycle pallets, the two standard cells that cover that process are the pallet stapler, up to 700 pallets per shift, and the pallet sorter.