Faber Halbertsma Group Rebrands As Faber Group, New Name Celebrates New Focus

Rebranded Faber Group aims for growth as part of a shift towards sustainable service-focused operations.

The newly-rebranded Faber Group is shifting its focus towards optimising its circular pooling system after combining pallet production and pooling since 1997. The Dutch family business, which has been an integral part of the circular economy for more than 25 years, has announced its plans for growth.

It follows the sale of its production arm in 2019, a change in a direction driven by CEO Ingrid Faber due to the lack of synergy between pallet production and pallet pooling.

The company plans to invest in growing its pay-per-use circular systems with a focus on load carriers, supported by the increasing use of digitisation. This will enable Faber Group’s customers to optimise their supply chain with enriched data, as well as helping the company increase its pallet recovery rate.

Previously known as the Faber Halbertsma Group, the company has grown to have a turnover of EUR 330m and 550 full-time staff. Under its new purpose of ‘carrying impact’, it wants to give concrete meaning to the concept of sustainability.

“Pallets used to be discarded, but if you check them regularly and repair them, you can keep them running in a pool for up to 10 years,” said Ingrid Faber. “That is beneficial for the customer, better for the environment, and a good business model for us.”

“We all have to do our part to reduce our carbon footprint and work towards a greener, healthier, better world. But the difference with other companies is that Faber Group has always done this, from the day it was established. Sustainability comes naturally to us.”

“Our DNA will never be tampered with, but it needed new wording which effectively expresses our ambition for substantial, sustainable growth.”

“We will expand on our service and product portfolio with new, innovative ways to carry the loads of our customers. This will make us a more attractive proposition for more new customers and market segments.”

Last year, Faber Group started a partnership with Dutch IoT Solutions called Connected Load Carrier, with the aim of using IoT (Internet of Things) technology to gather data about pallet usage to support customers in digitising supply chains. Connected pallets are provided with a tag that can measure a host of variables, such as how much weight they carry, how often they are damaged and what temperatures they are used in.

“We try to limit the loss of pallets as much as possible and data will help us with this. We can already see a lot: date, location, quantities, loss percentages and information about where our customers send the pallets. But we want to go even further,” added Ingrid Faber.

“We use this information to prevent loss and ultimately increase the reuse rate. Everything contributes to more circular movements and more frequent rotation, which means fewer new pallets are needed.”

The roots of the Faber Group can be traced back to 1891 when the Halbertsma family started producing wooden butter barrels, followed by the Faber family in 1935. Both companies merged in 1992. The companies IPP, PRS, PAKi, vPOOL and Satim are members of the Faber Group.

The company has recently been awarded ‘platinum’ status by Ecovadis, a rating platform for corporate social responsibility, which places it as one of the top one per cent of the most sustainable companies in its market.