Plastic Crates For Moving Is a Non-Solution

Searching the Internet for industry innovations, I came across a company’s web site stating they rent plastic crates by the month for office moves.  By the month?  I can’t imagine how much this surrogate solution would cost. Can your business shut down for a week, much less a month?  So I had to ask myself, what is the appeal of plastic crates?  The answer: they seem practical.  The reality: they are not.

The unfortunate truth is that plastic crates, much like packing boxes, will greatly decrease productivity both on the front end of an office move during the packing (when the office shuts down) and at the tail end when the stacked boxes cause a moving hangover.

Time costs money

Unproductive time costs money, and the moving hangover that accompanies boxing or plastic crating will cause aggravation, frustration and will prevent your company from getting back on its feet. Unless money is no object, stay away from boxes or plastic crates.  Either way, you run into stacking issues and you don’t have access to your items once packed. Lost productivity causes lost dollars at a time when you need revenue to pay for the new facility.

Why endure all the extra time and work of packing when you don’t have to?  You need and deserve a box-less move, and here is the crazy thing – it costs less, not just in your hidden payroll and lost revenue, but even in your out-of-pocket expenses.

Office gondolas – a real solution

A real solution to boxing during a move (either traditionally or with plastic crates) is “office gondolas.”  Loading a gondola – a rolling bookshelf – takes a tenth of the time, and best of all you have access to all your goods during the entire process. Almost anything can be loaded onto a gondola, including files, books, supplies, personal effects, and even some inventory.  Benefits? They move quickly with a minimum of effort and can be used immediately upon delivery. The great thing is the gondolas alone are less expensive than boxes or plastic crates.

It also is very GREEN. Gondolas are useful and reusable for decades, saving the environment from the costly effects of petrol based plastic manufacturing and from deforestation.  Save trees, save money, save the hassle.

Secure chain of custody

One of the nicest things about using gondolas is the way in which you can relocate highly confidential material securely using the chain of custody protocol. Moving with boxes or plastic crates will forever more leave your company open to the possibility that there was in fact a breach during the move. Using the secure protocol with gondolas becomes your defensible proof that no protected material could have been breached because of the procedures employed. See protected information relocation requires strict chain of custody procedures.

Find a true office mover

Movers who offer plastic moving crates expose that they are not truly invested in office moving. Household movers will purchase these for very little money (or rent them) to give the appearance that they have experience in office moving, but the pitfalls are felt by the movers themselves and the customers.   Plastic crates make a really unstable load in the trucks and take a long time to load and unload.  Customers suffer from the same packing/unpacking problems as with cardboard boxing. Files and items cannot be immediately accessed after the move, nor before.  Files and goods get out-of-order easily, so you spend valuable time trying to find the next box to locate what you are looking for. Time, hassle, disorganization – who needs it?

Traditional box or plastic crate moves cost you greatly:

• Takes a lot of extra effort packing
• All your books, files, etc., become inaccessible as soon as they are packed
• Takes much longer to move
• Eats up trees, bad for the environment, bad for everyone
• Produces the moving hangover
• Removal hassle
• Breach of protected material possible

Box-less move saves money, effort, and trees:

• Normally loaded the day of move (costs less, boosts morale)
• All books, files, desk contents can be accessed even during move
• “Office Gondolas” move in less time than boxes
• Environmentally “friendly”
• Gets your office back up and running immediately
• Gondolas leave with movers
• Prevents data breach

Find a mover that is fully invested, trained and experienced in how to reduce downtime, save you money and eliminate hassle.  Avoid the moving hangover and find an office mover that employs a box-less system.