FEATURE | BELOW-THE-HOOK
Safer lifting, smarter hooks
Below-the-hook (BTH) smart lifting devices are advanced specialised attachments like automated grippers, vacuum lifters and intelligent magnets. These connect to cranes or hoists to securely lift and move loads more safely, precisely and efficiently. Often custom-engineered, they replace manual handling, reducing risk and improving control over complex or heavy loads. Dan Cave investigates.
A
cross history, if those purchasing goods wanted a tweak to their product, wished to return it, wanted something different
entirely or even had a complaint, they have not always been considered to have the right to ask. No one truly knows when this changed.
There’s a historical mystery around when today’s prevailing consumerist credo, ‘the customer is always right,’ first came in. Was it ancient Chinese merchants, scrupulous in their business dealings? Or was it the famous hoteliers and department store retailers of the early 20th century, such as Marshall Field, John Wanamaker and Harry Selfridge, who, wanting to move past a customer- dismissing caveat emptor, and make good customer relations a unique selling point, sought to kowtow to buyer demands? Regardless, the ethos is now an essential cornerstone of global commerce and merchandising, and it drives commerce well outside the Anglosphere. Le client n’a jamais tort. Der Kunde ist König. The customer, wherever they are, is always right. For those in lifting and material handling applications, especially those involved in the manufacture and retail of below-the-hook (BTH) devices, a customer-first approach also guides business. Hardly surprising when such devices have to meet the lifting and load-securing needs of customers across a variety of heavy and precision industries, where safety and precision are paramount and each operating environment is defined by specific, unique characteristics. Indeed, IntelMarketResearch analysis shows that market drivers of below-the-hook needs today are very broad: from infrastructure developments in Asia and the Middle East, to technological advancements (such as the Internet of Things and automated manufacturing), to growing manufacturing demand for sectors like wind energy. It’s not surprising that BTH manufacturing tries to meet customers where they are at.
That’s not to say there are clear trends in what
is wanted. Although traditional BTH devices are varied – mechanical grabs and clamps, securing loads in warehouses and steel yards; vacuum lifters to lift glass, metal and plastic sheets without damage; magnetic lifters for ferrous materials; and C-hooks and coil lifters, extremely common in rolls of steel and paper in warehousing – it is still traditional lifting beams or spreaders that dominate, which distribute weight evenly across pipes and containers. Indeed, lifting beams make up 27% of the market share according to IntelMarketResearch 2025 numbers. But below-the-hook devices are often
customised, and it is acute customisation that appears to be driving buying decisions when it comes to these specialist devices. Again, hardly surprising given the broad application. Lifting and spreader beams and bars are common in construction in civil engineering, vacuum lifters in automotive and aerospace engineering, C-hooks and magnetic lifters in metal fabrication. Given each operating space has its own characteristics and restraints, says Dan Sherwood, engineering specialist with a below-the-hook focus at Mazella Companies, a major player in the BTH manufacturing space, a main driver of below-the- hook innovation and manufacturing is meeting what the customer needs. “We deliver standard lifting beams a lot of the time, and the standard pluses, which are a little bit different from catalogue items (essentially changing dimensions or adding additional pick points),” says Sherwood. “But a lot of what we run into is where we have to get creative, to come up with things that may not have been seen before or are deviations from what has come previously… not necessarily lifters that would fall under designated categories of lifter or manipulator.” Given IntelMarketResearch analysis shows that industry dependent precision is a major driver of overall growth and that newer sectors, such as
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