After moving home, man find themselves surrounded by more empty boxes than they can shake a roll of Sellotape at. If you have a move on the horizon, and are of an ecologically conscious nature, you may well wonder what’s the most appropriate way to deal with them. Sure, they’ll biodegrade over time, but you want to avoid putting anything in landfill if you can possibly avoid it. Likewise, recycling may not always be the most eco-friendly solution, especially with such uneven recycling provision available from local councils throughout the country.
Whether you’re transporting your moving boxes from your old home or from Self Storage in Chiswick, the eco-friendly mover knows that reusing and repurposing are always preferable to recycling or binning.
With that in mind, here are some innovative uses for your old moving boxes…
Transform them into attractive and useful storage baskets
A move is a great opportunity to go all Marie Kondo on your new home and start bringing more efficient storage solutions to keep your home clean and tidy. Those anonymous brown cardboard boxes can easily be transformed into attractive storage boxes with some fabric, glue, stitching and creative flair. If they’re robust enough to help you move, they’re more than up to the challenge of keeping your bedding and towels tucked away.
Never use a plastic plant pot again
Paint your cardboard moving boxes, fill them with a plastic bag, add some air holes and fill with soil. Ta-dah! You can now create plant pots for your home, garden or window box that are beautiful, robust and completely personalised.
Convert them into a scratching pad
Cats need a little while to get their bearings in a new home. One of the ways in which they mark their territory is by scratching nearby objects so that the scent glands in their paws mark the area as “theirs”. If you’d rather they didn’t do this with your furniture you can cobble together a cat scratching pad out of corrugated cardboard. After all, the ones that they sell in pet shops use the exact same manufacturing techniques. Why not save yourself some money?
Keep weeds away
Need to tame the garden in your new home? Did you know that flattened out cardboard boxes can be a great way to keep weeds at bay? Simply lay them down over weed prone areas and spray with a garden hose to make sure they stick. Then top them off with a layer of topsoil and hey presto! Even the most persistent weeds will struggle to poke through.
Create a low-budget bird feeder
Want to ensure that the beautiful local birds stop by your new garden to say hello? Cut your cardboard moving boxes into strips and roll them into a cylindrical shape similar to a toilet roll holder. Then daub the surface with peanut butter and roll it in birdseed. Voila! Your old cardboard will be a welcome treat for tired and hungry birds in your area.
And remember, if you’re moving home investing in a storage unit can make for an easier and more leisurely move. At Henfield Storage we do all that we can to support both long and short haul movers. If you’re looking for a higher standard of self storage in Chiswick as well as Southwark, Staples Corner, Wimbledon or Horsham click here to get to know our self storage options a little better!