Do your desk drawers accumulate clips, pens, erasers, tape, etc., without any order? Would you like to have all this material at hand and be able to find it the first time? This guide will show you how to organize office supplies with cardboard boxes that you can find in Selfpackaging. Increase your productivity thanks to organization by following these tips.
Having your office supplies in order will allow you to find what you need at a glance. You will save time, but you will also benefit from the following advantages:
- It will increase your productivity and discipline
- You will achieve greater concentration
- You will not lose anything again
- An organized space makes work easier
- It will decrease your stress
- It will increase your self-confidence
The main keys to achieve that order are throw away everything that is worn and have a place for everything. In this way, you will prevent the desk drawer from becoming a landfill and it will be easier for you to put things in their place once you finish using them.
Advantages of organizing with cardboard boxes
Cardboard boxes are ideal for storing virtually all kinds of office accessories. In fact, they are preferred by Marie Kondo when it comes to organizing and ordering cabinets, shelves and drawers. Among its main advantages are:
- According to a study by the Institute for Research on Energy and the Environment, cardboard is the most environmentally friendly material by limiting carbon dioxide and oil emissions by up to 60%, compared to other types of packaging.
- There is a wide variety of boxes with different sizes and shapes that facilitate the organization of documents, medium-sized accessories such as staplers, hole punches, labelers, rubber stamps or smaller ones such as clips, rubber bands, staples, etc.
- They can be stacked to optimize space, as well as combining different sizes so that there are no wasted spaces.
- They protect from dust and dirt, prolonging the life of your accessories and offering a much more careful appearance that generates confidence.
- You can adhere stickers or labels to identify what is inside without having to open them. They can even be personalized with your company or brand logo to offer a much more professional image.
How to organize your office supplies step by step
Although it may seem that having everything in sight when you open the drawer is a good option for storing your office supplies and accessories, it is not the most optimal or the most efficient when it comes to organizing it. Without a doubt, storage space is lost, but also time when you start to rummage everything to find something concrete.
Organizing by boxes will help you optimize the space you have quickly and economicallyas you will be able to check below.
1º.- Delete before ordering
The first step will be to discard everything that does not work or you do not use. Empty the drawers and try that mountain of pens to keep the ones that really write. Keep what you use regularly close at hand and store what you use from time to time in a less accessible place -like a loft-. It is a task that can take you hours, but do not doubt that it is time well spent.
2º.- Save according to the size
It is important that each thing has a place adapted to its dimensions. For this reason, to organize my office accessories I used boxes of different sizes:
- Square with flap closure 5.9 x 6.3 x 6.3 cm. This size is ideal for storing: hole punches, rolls of tape or washi tape, USB cables, flash drives, clip clips, rubber stamps, etc.
- Rectangular in the shape of a matchbox of 2.5 x 9.4 x 6.4 cm. They are perfect for storing small accessories such as clips, staples, thumbtacks, grommet binders, jump rings, rubber bands, etc.
- Tray with handle 7 x 32.5 x 20 cm. In it, 15 square boxes or 24 rectangular boxes like those indicated above can be stored in an orderly manner.
In this way, in a very small space you can have a multitude of materials and accessories of different sizes perfectly organized.
On the other hand, its assembly is simple and fast, you will only need a few minutes as you can see in the following video.
3º.- Label and personalize
When we organize with boxes, it is essential to label or write down what is inside to quickly locate what we are going to need. To do this, you can either write down the content directly on the box or paste an adhesive label that we can renew if the content changes.
They can also be personalized with your logo or brand. In this way, a much more professional appearance is offered, you can even use them as merchandising if you want to have a detail with your clients.
4º.- In the drawer or shelf
Finally, place the boxes on a chest of drawers or shelf. In my case, the size of the trays was ideal to insert them in my chest of drawers. Now I just have to open the drawer to locate what I want in a few seconds without having to rummage through anything.
If you don’t have a chest of drawers, you can stack the boxes on a shelf or on your desk. You will only occupy a small space in which you can keep your material organized and free of dust.
On the other hand, when classifying the boxes you can follow an alphabetical order or a logical order, placing what you use most frequently closer to you.
Tips to keep your office tidy
Now that you have organized it, you will want to maintain that order, right? Take note of these extra tricks to keep your office tidy:
- Filing cabinets are very useful for keeping your documents organized, but nowadays they are less necessary than before. Scan or request a digital copy of your documents and take advantage of cloud services to save them, you will save space and be more respectful of the environment.
- Having everything organized, but with a tangle of cables hanging from your desk does not convey a sense of order. Bundle them with cable ties and use an organizer for the power strips.
- If you don’t have enough space, take advantage of the walls to place shelves or vertical organizers that allow you to have everything you need at hand.
- Create the habit of putting everything you use back in its place, otherwise your office can return to chaos in no time (much less than it cost you to organize it).
- Do not abuse the decorations, although it is always good to have one that encourages us or reminds us of a good time, do not flood your desktop with them. My rule: three maximum.
Do you use cardboard boxes for organize office supplies? I hope this article has given you ideas on how to do this to increase your productivity and self-confidence. You can find many more guides on DIY and decoration at
