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This is a working blog, not a content programme. Everything here is written by somebody on the payroll about work they did that week — grading, wash chemistry, freight scheduling, fabrication. The annual reports include the landfill line and the mistakes, because a number without a denominator is marketing.
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Sixteen years on Bancroft Avenue
Four decisions made this business and two of them looked like mistakes at the time. Here is the honest version, written for anyone thinking about doing something similar.
Marisol Trejo · 8 min read
Heat, UV and what a summer does to HDPE
Uncovered outdoor storage roughly halves a container's working life. The mechanism is not complicated and neither is the fix.
Industry · Apr 16, 2026Why Bay Area breweries switched from drums to totes
Five years ago most of our brewery customers bought drums. Now almost none do. The reason is not the price of the container.
Fabrication · Mar 19, 2026Building a wash station for a farmers market
Commercial portable sinks start around $900. Ours are $310, they roll onto a pallet jack, and they pass the same health inspection.
By topic
Eight subject areas, each written by whoever actually owns that part of the yard.
Buying guide
Compliance
Fabrication
Freight & logistics
Industry
Seasonal
Sustainability
Yard notes
All 36 posts
Newest first, grouped by year.
2026
7 postsSixteen years on Bancroft Avenue
Four decisions made this business and two of them looked like mistakes at the time. Here is the honest version, written for anyone thinking about doing something similar.
Yard notesJun 11, 2026Heat, UV and what a summer does to HDPE
Uncovered outdoor storage roughly halves a container's working life. The mechanism is not complicated and neither is the fix.
SeasonalApr 16, 2026Why Bay Area breweries switched from drums to totes
Five years ago most of our brewery customers bought drums. Now almost none do. The reason is not the price of the container.
IndustryMar 19, 2026Building a wash station for a farmers market
Commercial portable sinks start around $900. Ours are $310, they roll onto a pallet jack, and they pass the same health inspection.
FabricationFeb 26, 2026Backhauls: how we cut 71% of our empty miles
A truck that goes out full and comes back empty has done half a job. Here is how we got the return leg loaded 71% of the time, and what it is worth to you.
Freight & logisticsFeb 5, 2026The pallet under the tote decides how long it lives
It is 20 to 45 pounds of the tare weight, it takes every impact and all of the moisture, and it is the component people notice last.
Buying guideJan 15, 20262025 in numbers
Forty-one thousand one hundred containers, rebottling up 38%, refusal rate back down where it belongs, and a harvest week we handled better than the year before but still not well.
Sustainability2025
17 postsWhat procurement teams ask that nobody else does
A yard foreman asks what it costs and when it arrives. A procurement team asks nine other things, and they are mostly good questions.
Buying guideNov 27, 2025Our solar array, three years in
Modelled at a nine-year payback, running about two years ahead. Also: the two loads it does not touch, and why we did not oversize it.
SustainabilityNov 6, 2025Leasing beat buying for 41 customers last year
Three situations account for essentially all of it: seasonal demand, no storage, and a project that ends with a disposal bill. If none of those apply to you, buy.
Buying guideOct 16, 2025Stress-crazing: the failure you can see coming
Forty-six per cent of everything we scrap dies of this, and almost all of it announces itself months in advance to anyone holding a torch at the right angle.
Yard notesSep 25, 2025Sanitising a tote for potable water, step by step
A wash certificate is not a sanitisation certificate. If the water is going to be drunk, there is one more step, and it is not complicated.
ComplianceSep 4, 2025The second-hand steel market and your cage price
People assume tote prices track plastic. They track steel at least as much, and the mechanism is not obvious until you look at where the mass is.
IndustryAug 13, 2025Crush week: what actually happens in the yard
For about eight days each August this yard stops being a warehouse and becomes a scheduling problem. Here is what that actually looks like from the freight desk.
SeasonalJul 24, 2025Why we refuse about six per cent of everything offered
It is the least profitable decision I make and the one I am least willing to negotiate on. Here is what makes a container unbuyable.
ComplianceJul 2, 2025Manifolding four totes into one tank
The standard answer when somebody needs 1,100 gallons and has a 48-inch door. Done right it behaves like one tank; done wrong it behaves like four tanks and a headache.
FabricationJun 11, 2025Rain is over. Now store the water.
Catching rain in a Mediterranean climate is the easy half. The hard half is having something usable in the tank when September arrives.
SeasonalMay 21, 2025How we price a lot of empties sight unseen
Two photographs and a count. That is genuinely enough to quote a firm price on most lots, and here is exactly what I am reading in them.
Yard notesApr 30, 2025The truth about "food grade" listings on marketplaces
Every IBC bottle ever made is food-grade plastic. That is why the phrase appears on almost every listing, and why it tells you nothing at all.
IndustryApr 9, 2025Grade B is the most underrated product in the yard
Roughly a third of the Grade A totes I sell go into applications where a Grade B would have done the same job for forty dollars less a unit. That is my fault as much as anyone's.
Buying guideMar 18, 2025Freight class, NMFC and why empty totes cost so much to ship
An empty tote weighs 125 lb and occupies 13 cubic feet of truck. Freight is priced on the second number, which is why shipping air is the most expensive thing we do.
Freight & logisticsFeb 27, 2025What we learned building 400 wicking planters
The first forty we built were wrong in three ways. Four hundred later, here is the design we have settled on and why each decision is the way it is.
FabricationFeb 4, 2025Gasket material is not a detail
People specify the container carefully and then accept whatever gasket is in the box. It is the cheapest component and the most common point of failure.
ComplianceJan 16, 20252024 in numbers: everything we moved
Thirty-nine thousand four hundred containers, 98.4% diversion, two customers lost to our own scheduling and one piece of equipment we should have bought two years earlier.
Sustainability2024
12 postsThe five emails that get the fastest quote
I read every request that comes into this yard. About 40% of them need a follow-up question before I can quote, and it is nearly always the same missing information.
Yard notesNov 14, 2024Winterising an outdoor tote fleet
San Francisco barely freezes. Livermore, Sacramento and the foothills absolutely do, and every January we buy back containers that spent December full to the brim.
SeasonalOct 22, 2024We granulated 91 tonnes last quarter. Here is where it went.
Recycling claims are usually a percentage with no denominator. Here is one quarter, weighed across a certified scale, with the destinations named.
SustainabilitySep 30, 2024Reading a UN plate in sixty seconds
It is a licence plate, and almost nobody reads it. Sixty seconds with the marking tells you what the container may legally carry and whether it is still allowed to.
ComplianceSep 3, 2024What happened to the wine country tote market
North Bay demand has not fallen. It has moved — out of purchase orders and into eleven-week leases, and out of estate wineries and into custom crush.
IndustryAug 6, 2024The case against the 330 gallon tote
On paper the 330 wins every comparison. On a warehouse floor it loses about a quarter of them, and always for the same reason.
Buying guideJul 15, 2024Harvest is coming: book food-grade stock now
Every year the same thing happens. In June nobody calls about food-grade stock. In late August everybody calls in the same ten days. Here is the arithmetic behind that.
SeasonalJun 19, 2024Why your forklift is the real constraint
More orders go wrong because of handling equipment than because of anything we do. The capacity number painted on your forklift is not the number that applies to a full tote.
Freight & logisticsMay 28, 2024The caustic circuit, explained without the chemistry degree
Everyone pictures a pressure washer. The pressure is the least important part. Here is what is actually removing the residue, and why it lets us use seven gallons of fresh water instead of a hundred and ten.
SustainabilityMay 2, 2024We stopped buying from three suppliers this spring
Two brokers and one processor came off our buying list between January and April. None of it was dramatic. All of it was avoidable, and the pattern is worth writing down.
IndustryApr 8, 2024Nine ways an IBC bottle actually fails
Fourteen years of grading and I can tell you that almost every bottle dies of one of nine things. Seven of them announce themselves months in advance if you know where to look.
Yard notesMar 12, 2024What a tote costs us before it costs you
People assume a used tote is nearly free money because we did not manufacture it. Here is the actual cost sheet, including the 14% that never makes it to the sales pallet.
Yard notesSix people, one payroll.
Nobody here is a content writer. Every post is by the person who owns that part of the operation, which is why the freight posts are about scheduling and the chemistry posts have dwell times in them.
Marisol Trejo
Founder & Managing Partner
Desmond Okafor
Yard Manager
Priya Raghunathan
Wash Chemistry & Compliance
Tomás Beltrán
Fabrication Lead
Ingrid Halvorsen
Freight & Logistics
Wesley Kam
Quote Desk Lead
