• How will the materials be received and shipped?
  Shipping materials from a loading dock allows for more space than materials that have to be received and shipped from a cold room. This will affect the size, lifting capacity and maneuverability of the lift truck required.

• What is the weight/size of materials that have to be lifted?
  Bigger is not always better in the materials handling business. One could easily reason that you just get a bigger truck for heavier loads. Bigger trucks require more space to move and may cost more, making it not the most suitable solution where heavy materials in small spaces have to be moved. Hence, we need to know which material to use so that it will reduce the cost and also be more efficient and effective in handling materials that are bulky. In addition, if the weight/size of the material is small, we probably should not use equipment that is big and expensive because it will show that the equipment is not fully utilized. Therefore, the weight and size of the material is one factor that we need to consider when choosing the type of equipment to use.

• At which height must the materials be stored?
  Lift height and load size determines the capacity of a lift truck. A bigger load size moves the lift truck´s center of gravity, reducing the lifting capacity, making the height at which the materials that have to be stored just as important as the load. This means that if we need to place a material(usually bulky ones) at a higher level of the rack, we will need to use equipment that can reach that height so that the material can be place there properly. However, if the material is to be stored on the floor or second/third level of the rack, we can just use simply equipment such as pallet trucks.

• Types of material?
  The type of equipment we use will also depends on the types of material. For example, if the material is expensive and need to be well taken care of, it should be handled properly and the equipment(not shaky,do not have sharp edges,etc) used must be right so that the material will not get damaged.
  It is same for how vulnerable the material is. If the materials are easily breakable, right equipment should also be used to handled them so that the material will not break and get thrown away. This will only incurred more cost which is not favorable to the company.
  One more example can be that if the material is hazardous, RIGHT equipment should be used to handled them. The equipment must prevent the material from spilling, falling off from it, and also prevent it from injuring the workers there.

• Quantity of the material?
  This means the amount of materials needed to be handled. If a large amount of materials is needed to be handled, a big equipment with large capacity is definitely needed to do the job. Therefore, we will need to know the quantity of the material when we are choosing the equipment that is needed to handle them.

These factors help the company to reduce cost by fully utilized the equipment, reduce labor cost if the equipment can handle the material more efficient then the labor, and get the right equipment for right type of material. As logistic aims to be a profit center instead of a cost center, we should not waste too much money on redundant equipment (equipment that are not used/needed in the warehouse).