The modern pallet grew out of the forklift. Wooden skids were used with early powered lift trucks in the 1910s, the first patents for platforms with a bottom deck followed in the 1920s and 1930s, wartime logistics made palletized handling routine, and in 1961 European railways agreed on a standardized, exchangeable 1200 × 800 mm pallet that became the Euro pallet.
Before the pallet: skids and hand trucks
For most of history, goods were moved piece by piece: sacks on backs, barrels rolled across docks, crates stacked by hand. Simple wooden platforms called skids, two or more runners with boards on top, were used in factories to keep goods off the floor and allow a hand truck to slide under them. A skid has no bottom deck, so it can be lifted from the sides only, a limitation explained in skids vs pallets.
The decisive change was mechanical lifting. According to a historical overview in the trade magazine Inside Logistics, Clark Equipment built what is described as the first forklift truck in the United States in 1917, and it used skids as load carriers. Once a machine could lift, the goal became a platform designed for the machine rather than a skid adapted to it.
The 1920s to 1940s: the pallet takes shape
The same overview reports that a patent for a "lift truck platform" was filed in 1924 by Howard T. Hallowell, and that a patent for a transport pallet was granted to George Raymond Sr. and William House on November 7, 1939. Early patents are often cited with different names and dates in different sources, so these should be treated as milestones rather than a single "inventor" story.
Two further developments from the 1940s are widely credited:
- Four-way entry. Robert Braun is reported to have patented a four-way pallet in 1945, allowing forks to enter from all sides (see two-way vs four-way pallets).
- The one-way pallet. A patent for a cheap pallet meant for a single trip is attributed to supply officer Norman Cahners in 1949.
During the Second World War, the US military relied on palletized supply handling to move large volumes of material quickly through ports, depots and ships. After the war, that experience carried into industry: manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers adopted pallets and forklifts together, and the unit-load approach spread from the military to commerce.
1950s and 1960s: standards and the Euro pallet
Postwar Europe faced a different problem. Goods crossed borders by rail, and every railway and shipper used its own pallet dimensions, so loads had to be restacked at frontiers. In 1961 the International Union of Railways (UIC) signed an agreement establishing a standardized, exchangeable pallet for rail use. Its dimensions were 1200 × 800 × 144 mm (47.2 × 31.5 × 5.7 in). The pallet had four-way entry and carried the letters EUR in an oval, plus the mark of the railway that registered it.
The technical specification for the wooden pallet was set out in UIC Leaflet 435. In the 1970s, management of the European pallet pool passed to a newly established European pallet association, and a German quality body, Gütegemeinschaft Paletten, took over quality assurance.
Wikipedia credits the Swedish brothers Ivar and Tore Svensson of Gyllsjö with the original design behind the European pallet. The same source describes it as dramatically speeding up the loading of railway wagons.
| Year | Milestone | Source basis |
|---|---|---|
| 1917 | Clark builds an early US forklift using skids | Inside Logistics |
| 1924 | Lift truck platform patent filed (Hallowell) | Inside Logistics |
| 1939 | Raymond and House pallet patent granted | Inside Logistics |
| 1945 | Four-way pallet patent (Braun) | Inside Logistics |
| 1961 | UIC agreement on the exchangeable pallet | UIC, Wikipedia |
| 1991 | EPAL founded as a separate association | Inside Logistics, Wikipedia |
| 2013 | UIC and EPAL separate their Euro pallet activities | Inside Logistics |
The Euro pallet, EPAL and quality control
Over time, low-quality copies of the Euro pallet damaged the reputation of the exchange system. EPAL (European Pallet Association e.V.) was founded in 1991 to protect the standard through licensing, branding and inspection of producers and repairers. Today, genuine pallets carry the EPAL oval and are produced to defined board, block and nail specifications; the system is described in the Euro pallet and EPAL, and unauthorized copies in fake Euro pallets.
Following the UIC–EPAL separation in 2013, both organizations continued to administer their own marking schemes for the same basic 1200 × 800 mm pallet, which is why EUR and EPAL markings can appear together on older pallets. Total circulation is uncertain; UIC cites over 500 million Euro pallets, while Wikipedia gives a range of 350 to 500 million.
Pooling, exchange and sustainability
The idea that a pallet could be a shared, reusable asset developed alongside the Euro pallet. In open exchange systems, a carrier delivers a loaded pallet and receives an equivalent empty one. Rental pools, the best known being the blue pallets introduced by the Australian company CHEP, keep ownership with a pool operator that collects, repairs and reissues the pallets. These systems are explained in pallet pooling.
From the 1990s, the history of the pallet became tied to plant health rather than just handling. Following the spread of tree pests in solid wood packaging, the IPPC adopted ISPM 15, an international standard requiring treatment and marking of wood packaging in international trade, with 2002 the year of adoption. Alternatives to wood, including plastic and presswood, developed in parallel; see ISPM 15 explained for the rules that shape export pallets today.
Why the history still matters
Many of today's rules trace directly to these decisions. The Euro pallet's 1200 × 800 mm footprint, chosen for railway wagons, still determines how pallets fit into trucks and containers. The North American 48 × 40 in pallet and the other sizes recognized internationally followed their own regional paths, compared in pallet sizes by country. A pallet is therefore best understood as an agreed interface between machines, vehicles and organizations, not just a wooden platform.
Frequently asked questions
Who invented the pallet?
No single inventor exists. Skids preceded it, and patents for lift-truck platforms and pallets appeared from the 1920s onward, including filings by Howard T. Hallowell (1924) and George Raymond Sr. and William House (1939). Developers of the later Euro pallet are separate figures.
When was the Euro pallet introduced?
European railways signed the UIC agreement establishing the standardized, exchangeable pallet in 1961. The pallet measures 1200 × 800 × 144 mm.
When was EPAL founded?
EPAL, the European Pallet Association, was founded in 1991 to safeguard the quality of the Euro pallet and counter inferior copies.
What did the Second World War change for pallets?
Large-scale military logistics made palletized handling with forklifts standard practice, and the postwar economy carried that practice into industry.
Sources
- The pallet pioneers — Inside Logistics
- The standardised EUR pallet — UIC (International Union of Railways)
- EUR-pallet — Wikipedia