Bob,
nice ideas, and all been suggested in the past!
Firstly, we were the UK supplier having firstly imported the material. The cost of using a 3rd party to would be excessive and far out weigh any profit we might have made from the granite. The slabs are upto 4m by 2.5m, packed upto 8 per crate, and upto 10 per container. Each slab (at that size) weighs approx 850kg. In order for them to be picked up by FLT, we would need to approach from the side, which you can't do with the container. A flt capable of lifting something 4m long and weighing close to 9t would not fit into the rear of a closed top container, plus you have got the "reach/conterbalance" issues to consider.
We also looked into using a 3rd party to unload containers for us, but again, the cost was excessive considering the worth of the granite, so unless folks want to start paying lots more for worktops, sounters, hotel lobby's, building cladding etc, that was never going to be an option, plus we also had increased haulage costs.
The idea of sacrificing the container by acetylene cutting was also discussed, but again excessive £££. And we would then have the issue of time to cut the container into managable pieces to dispose of. A container tales about 2hrs to safely cut into to allow unloading, then another 3-4 hours to cut up, so when we had upto 5 containers a day, it becomes a big problem.
And yes, all of the above puts profit before the employee who has to get into the container, however, no profit, no business! As I said, this particular stone business was "behind the times" and had little or no control over who, or how the slabs were loaded. I know that the Indian supplier load all the slabs by hand, then build the crates round the slabs, so that makes it more difficult to get the crates out.
As I said, I'm out of that business now, but its the "way things are done in the granite slab industry", and the business levels aren't there to sustain higher prices, however, I'm sure that the HSE could have visited us on any day of the week and quite easily given a improvement, or probably a prohibition notice. The industry is always remorseful when accidents or deaths occur, but as individuals company's still havent come up with a solution to the problem that allows them to make £££!
Granite takes thousands of years to form, perhaps it's unreasonable to expect the the industry to change quickly!
Not trying to defend what happens, I know its not right, but changing it is a whole different problem!
Holmezy