Export Crating, Packing, Blocking & Bracing in Toronto

Custom wood crates and skids

Each crate is designed around the piece: weight, centre of gravity, lift points, and whether it will be handled by forklift, crane or hand. Heavy machinery gets a skid base with runner boards sized for the forklift entry and bolted or banded to the base. Delicate items get internal cradles, foam blocking and a lid that can be removed without prying. Reusable crates — for tooling, exhibition material or fixtures that travel between locations — are built with screwed panels and labelled for repeat use.

All lumber and plywood is ISPM-15 compliant: heat-treated, marked with the IPPC stamp and traceable to the certified supplier. That is a legal requirement for wood packaging entering almost every country, and an uncertified crate is the most common reason export cargo is held or fumigated at the destination port.

• Fully enclosed crates, open crates and skid bases
• Machinery and equipment crating with bolted or banded attachment
• Foam-lined crates for instruments, electronics, artwork and glass
• Reusable, multi-trip crates with screwed panels
• Heat-treated ISPM-15 lumber, IPPC-stamped
• Custom dimensions — from a single instrument to a 5-tonne press

Export packing and moisture protection

A container crossing an ocean goes through repeated temperature cycles, and the condensation that forms inside — "container rain" — is what corrodes machined surfaces and stains cartons. Export packing addresses it directly: vapour-barrier bags with VCI film for metal parts, calculated desiccant loads, shrink-wrap and corner protection for palletized goods, and shock or tilt indicators on anything that must not be dropped or laid over. Machinery is degreased, drained where required and protected at bare-metal points before it is sealed.

Palletized product for LCL or FCL is stretch-wrapped, banded and corner-boarded to the receiving CFS's standard so it survives the extra handling that consolidated freight gets.

Blocking and bracing inside the container

A crate that is not secured inside the container can move a metre during heavy weather, and the container walls are not designed to stop it. Our loading crews design the securement plan before loading: heavy pieces low and over the container's strongest structure, lumber blocking and bracing nailed to the floor and against the corrugations, airbags in voids, and strapping to the lashing points. The finished load is photographed from the doors before the seal goes on, and those photos are yours for the file. Block and bracing for rail and road shipments follows the same approach with the relevant securement standards.

This is the part most crating companies cannot do, because they do not load containers. It is also the part that decides whether a claim is paid.

Onsite crating at your facility

When the piece is too large to move uncrated — a production machine, a switchgear cabinet, a laboratory instrument still on its bench — the crew comes to you. We measure, pre-cut at the shop, and assemble the crate around the cargo at your plant, office, lab or job site anywhere in the GTA and Southern Ontario. The crated piece is then loaded onto our truck and either delivered to the container at our warehouse or loaded directly into a container positioned at your dock.

Receiving and uncrating on import

For inbound crated cargo we do the reverse: receive the container or crate at our warehouse, inspect and photograph the crate before opening, uncrate, remove and dispose of the packing material, and deliver the piece to its final position. Uncrating is part of our white-glove delivery service, which covers inside delivery and placement of equipment, fixtures and furniture.