Mass Products
Mass Products are the developers of the Roadpod concept and have been proudly operating their design & development facility on the Gold Coast since 2013. The company’s Managing Director, Paul Harazim has created a people first organisation and established a vastly experienced team of consultants, engineers, fabricators and technicians who form the heart of the business. Mass Products pride themselves on being the Industrial Manufacturing leaders in concepts, innovation, modelling and fabrication.
With a long history of assisting the Water & Wastewater industries manage their infrastructure and access needs, the team at Mass Products have become proficient at solving tricky safety issues in relation to falls from heights and confined space entries. This experience has led them to expand into other industries where they can use their expertise to solve other common workplace hazards.
Since branching out into other industries, it became apparent that the huge risk of falls from heights when loading trucks needed to be addressed and Mass Products were certain they could find a solution. After searching the current market to find a system readily available to stop personnel from climbing on top of trucks, they quickly realised there was nothing currently out there. This led to the design of a new product. They thought, what if freight could be packed on the ground, and then lift the entire load onto the truck? And that’s how Roadpod was born.
Roadpod
Two years were spent in design and development, working through issues ranging from safe lifting and securing the pods on the truck, to binding loads and the fabric of the pods themselves. Made from mild steel, Roadpods come in several different sizes and styles, able to suit different types of trucks as well as different materials and industries. They have been designed to be loaded on the ground, then lifted onto the truck where they are held in place with locators and locking pins. Through continued R&D, a custom storage racking system has also been developed, which has additional benefits for customers including yard space optimisation.
With falls being one of the most common causes of serious work-related injuries and deaths, Mass Products have endeavoured to help employers maintain safe working environments by offering cost effective, quality products and solutions. Injuries and fatalities related to falls from heights are devastating to workers, their families, co-workers and the community. Roadpod is the only fall prevention solution of its kind that allows companies to load and unload freight at ground level, ensuring that employees return home unharmed at the end of the workday.
The system eliminates 100% of falling from height risk. The team were happy to hear from Director of Keith Timber Group Michael Read that:
“Since the introduction of the Roadpod system, we have had zero incidents regarding the loading of trucks at heights as we are now able to load at ground level, something we’ve never been able to do before.”
Not only does the Roadpod system reduce workplace incidents but the efficiencies in loading turn-around times have since become a brilliant by-product. It was quickly realized that the time savings equaled serious money savings for customers. With increased deliveries, it may even be viable for the customer, to reduce the number of trucks in their fleet, further reducing overheads, maintenance, registration and all the other ongoing costs associated with owning a vehicle.
One of their customers who have also implemented the Roadpod system, South Coast Timber Supply, are already realising the benefits. Operations Manager Brendan Aulsebrook told the team that:
“South Coast Timber Supply have used Roadpod now for 12 months and they are one of the best investments our company has made to date. We have reduced our loading times by 25% and made the task much safer and user friendly as staff work from the ground level when loading. It has also given us flexibility to change deliveries on a given day without any cost. We are able to load pods way ahead of time which has made loading and delivery more of a working process rather than a rush to get the job on the truck.”
The Roadpod concept has now been around for close to four years and Mass Products continue to provide a highly personal experience for each and every customer. They recognise that every business operates differently so their team of engineers and safety experts personally attend each site to understand the varying business goals, current transport methods and infrastructure, how the customer currently manages the risk of working at heights, and the efficiency of the factory and freight yard operations.
The team at Mass Products and Roadpod have continued to design solutions to ensure businesses can become more profitable while preventing falling from heights risks. In an ever-increasing competitive market, they maintain a strong commitment to helping each customer reach their own goals of becoming more efficient and safer as their business continues to expand.
