Gaylord boxes in Chester County, Pennsylvania

This is the county of the mushroom belt. Farms around Kennett Square pack and ship fresh mushrooms in volumes that dwarf any other crop in the valley, and the compost, peat and packing that go with them move in bulk. A county of nurseries and horticulture sits beside it.

The rest of the county splits. West Chester, Exton and Malvern are pharmaceutical, medical device and specialty chemical towns; Coatesville and Downingtown carry the steel, manufacturing and farming of an older Pennsylvania. Each handles bulk boxes for different reasons and in different conditions.

The sourced mushroom figures sit on the Kennett Square page. Our research also lists food packing, nurseries and agriculture among the county's fillers and emptiers of bulk boxes.

No individual grower is named here as a customer, and we state no prices or volumes for any of them.

This page covers 19348, 19320, 19341, 19335, 19380, 19382, 19460, 19355, 19363, 19390, 19374 and 19311. The industries to expect there, from our market research: mushroom farming, food packing, pharmaceutical, agriculture and nurseries.

Mushrooms grow all year in climate-controlled houses, so the packing never fully stops. Nurseries peak in spring.

• Buy. Growers and packers who want clean boxes and liners, and nurseries who want cheap multi-use bins.
• Sell. Packers and manufacturers with extra Grade A or B stock.
• Recycle. Wet or damaged boxes from a packing floor; humidity is the enemy of board here.

Humid houses age corrugated fast. Tell us how the boxes were stored and we grade accordingly.

• Substrate. The compost mixture in which mushrooms grow, made on farms from straw, hay and manure and moved in bulk.
• Flush. A wave of mushrooms that fruits at once; a house produces several flushes before the substrate is spent and replaced.
• Nursery stock. Young plants grown for sale, shipped in bins and boxes during spring, a seasonal user of cheap multi-trip containers.

• Which part of the county and the ZIP.
• Whether the boxes are from a packing floor, a farm or a shop.
• How long and where they have been stored.
• The count, footprint and grade.