Better In Than Out

The #1 thing that will hurt your food storage is heat.  High temperatures will dramatically shorten the usable life of food you have put back.  The best place to store food is in a climate controlled area with relatively low temps and no light.  A basement comes to mind, but most people do not have this luxury.  Look for places in your home where the temperature stays well below 80 degrees, and even below 70 degrees if possible.

Let’s look at some good places for storing supplies within your home:

Look High

My lovely bride is rather short by comparison to me.  Therefore, she cannot reach the higher shelves anywhere in the house.  We take full advantage of the 3rd and 4th shelves in our kitchen and laundry cabinets to store cans and jars of food.  We are able to store dozens and dozens of cans/jars on these higher shelves and still leave plenty of room for everyday items that she can reach.

In your closets look at how much room you have at the top.  We have seen where you could run another row of shelving across the top of the door to store additional items.  Here, we go for lighter items such as paper products or packaged foods such as Mac and Cheese in boxes.

Look Low

Under beds is the first logical place to look.  Depending upon the height of your beds you certainly should be able to store cans and pint jars under your beds.  Quart jars need a bit more head room but are still possible with some beds.  We have been able to get 30 cases of pint jars under our bed with ease.  The number you can get will depend upon the size and height of your bed.

Look in your closets under your hanging clothes.  Your hanging close generally do not touch the floor.  There is usually enough room to store cans/jars on the floor and still have room for your hanging clothes.

Look under and behind your couch.  This is an oft overlooked area to store items.

Look Outside Your Home

This is the place to store items other than food.  For us, we have utilized our garage area for items not damaged by heat.  Paper products, water, tents and camping supplies.  We also store our cooking and outdoor toilets (buckets) on shelving in the garage.

Shelving is the key to organizing your garage.  Go high with your long-term storage items.  We use wired shelving units that are bolted to the studs in the garage walls.  Each shelf is rated at hundreds of pounds.

You could even go with a storage building to keep your supplies.  While this is an added expense that may not be for everyone you could take advantage of this for your outdoor storage.

The Best Idea For Storing Supplies

When we built our home we added a room the size of a bedroom just for our storage pantry.  We added shelving units that are 4 feet wide, 2 feet deep and 6 feet tall. Each unit has 5 shelves each.  This gives us tremendous storage capability with each unit.

We are able to control the amount of light that gets in the room and the temperature never exceeds 76 degrees.

We are able to stack items to the 9′ ceilings in this room.  This gives us enough food storage space to keep 1 rack for our everyday use and the rest of the racks for our long-term food storage,

This opportunity for storing supplies may not be available for everyone.  I mention it to give you an idea of what is possible and something to shoot for.

Do what you can with the space you have.  You will be amazed at what you can accomplish if you look for the opportunities that you have.