In an effort to lower the cost of your move, you may be willing to use trash bags and not cardboard boxes to pack up some of your items.
The use of garbage bags during a move is definitely an interesting idea that has the potential to save you both time and money throughout the house-packing process.
As you’ll see for yourself below, trash bags can be extremely useful when you’re packing for a move thanks to their numerous advantages as moving containers.
So, think twice before packing up your brand-new rolls of plastic trash bags in a moving box – instead, you should consider coming up with a good packing strategy that involves the heavy use of trash bags to save hard-earned money (trash bags are really inexpensive) and valuable time (packing things in garbage bags is very easy and very fast).
Read on to learn the best way to use trash bags when moving house – get familiar with innovative and creative packing ideas that can make your relocation so much easier and simpler.
Advantages of using trash bags when moving
Packing things in clean and strong garbage bags can be pretty advantageous and here’s why:
Trash bags are very inexpensive – you can buy a pack of 40 garbage bags for about $6-$8, or a bit more for super-strong branded ones such as Hefty.
Garbage bags are easily accessible – they can be purchased from almost every convenience store or grocery store near your home.
Those plastic bags offer very good protection from dirt, dust, and of course – from moisture as well.
Trash bags can be used for packing items of any shape and size as long as those things can actually fit inside the plastic bags. Thanks to the extraordinary level of flexibility of garbage bags, even oddly shaped things are no match for the plastic containers and will fit inside them without any problems whatsoever.
Using trash bags to pack up some of your items is pretty straightforward – all you have to do is insert into the bag whatever it is that you’re packing and then tie up the plastic container, either using its drawstring or using tape or pieces of string to close the opening.
Garbage bags are super flexible – as long as there are contain soft items inside them, they can be squeezed into really tight spaces, thus enabling you to maximize the storage space in your own car or inside a rental truck.
Regrettably, the use of clean and strong plastic trash bags when packing for a move is not without its share of disadvantages either.
Trash bags are too thin to provide decent protection against shocks, vibrations, or direct hits during transit.
Garbage bags are made of plastic and even though some of the containers can be pretty thick and durable, those bags can be torn fairly easily, especially when they get hooked on something or if items with sharp edges are packed by mistake into them.
Trash bags are not stackable simply because they are not sturdy enough and cannot keep a solid shape. As a result, they can be a bit tricky to load onto the moving vehicle.
Plastic trash bags could melt if the temperatures in the back of the truck reach extreme values on a hot summer day. That could be a potential problem, especially when you’re moving across the country and the shipment (your items) are going to spend many days on the road until they get delivered to the new address. And so, if some of the garbage bags happen to melt from the extreme heat, that will most likely damage the items inside them and possibly even the things that are right next to them.
Using garbage bags when moving can change the way you approach the arduous task of packing up your home. Even though not everything can be packed in plastic bags (and it shouldn’t), many of the non-breakable items you own can be quickly and safely packed into plastic bags with the purpose of decreasing the time you need to complete the packing process and cutting your moving costs at the same time.
How to properly use trash bags?
Here are the best ways to use trash bags when moving to a new home:
Use trash bags instead of cardboard boxes
While it’s true that cardboard boxes are much stronger than plastic bags and stack well inside a moving vehicle, packing boxes made of corrugated cardboard can take up plenty of space too, especially when soft, non-fragile items are packed inside them.
Using durable plastic trash bags instead of cardboard boxes can be advantageous.
In such cases, feel free to use clean and sturdy trash bags to pack various non-breakable household items such as sheets, blankets, pillows, curtains, tablecloths, towels, etc.
When you’re packing up the kids’ room, then all stuffed animals (plush toys) can easily and quickly go into garbage bags as well.
When we’re talking about the sheer speed of packing up things, then the method of using plastic trash bags is much faster compared to the one using standard cardboard boxes. It’s super easy, really – you just insert a pillow inside a plastic trash bag, seal the bag using either tape or its own drawstring, and you’re done.
There’s an awesome packing hack when it comes to hanging clothes – with the help of trash bags, you can actually pack up your clothes straight from the dresser in several minutes.
Follow these steps to pack your hanging clothes super quickly using large clean garbage bags:
Group around 5-7 hangers together with the hanging pieces of clothing on them, then use a small cable tie around their metal hooks to tie them up;
Take one large trash bag and make a tiny hole right in the middle of its bottom;
Place the plastic garbage bag over the grouped clothes still on their hangers, insert the fixed metal hooks through the hole, and then pull down the plastic bag over the hanging clothes until the latter are completely covered;
Secure the bottom of the plastic bag by pulling its drawstring (if available) or using packing tape to seal the opening, thus protecting the clothes from dust, dirt, and even moisture during the relocation.
Don’t use this packing trick for expensive designer clothes for fear of wrinkling them too much or even damaging some of them in the process. To pack the best pieces in your wardrobe, use special wardrobe boxes that will provide maximum protection on the road.
Use garbage bags to pack all or almost all soft items
You can use durable trash bags to pack up many of the soft items in the house. The main advantage of using plastic bags for soft and voluminous items instead of cardboard boxes is the storage space inside your car or rental truck.
When packed into clean trash bags, non-fragile items such as blankets, sheets, towels, pillows, and so on can be squeezed between other belongings, most often furniture pieces. This way, the bagged soft goods will serve as a padded layer of protection, keeping more fragile things relatively safe on the road.
The other bonus of packing soft items in trash bags is the increased speed compared to using standard cardboard boxes. So, when you have to pack up your things really quickly – often when you’re moving out in a hurry – then the usage of trash bags in the packing process should be more than welcome.
You shouldn’t transport your house plants in your car without proper protection.
If you’re moving only a short distance away, then you might decide to transport some of your house plants with you, preferably in your own car.
If that’s the case, then you’ll want to use trash bags to keep any potential soil from the pots from getting inside your vehicle.
Basically, all you have to do when packing plants for local transport is to insert the bottom of the pot or the plant itself inside a plastic bag to keep the dirt and soil from getting scattered inside your car. Use trash bags only to secure the bottoms of your house plants – otherwise, you’ll run the risk of suffocating those plants by cutting off the fresh air and sunlight.
You may not realize this, but plastic trash bags can be pretty useful and practical on Moving day. How?
You can use them to protect your floors from rain, dirt, and dust. If you happen to be moving in winter, then plastic garbage bags can protect your hardwood or carpeted floors from snow as well.
Here’s what you need to do:
Cut trash bags along one of their sides from top to bottom so that they can cover a much greater area than before they are cut.
Place the plastic bags over your hardwood, tiled, or carpeted floors along the spots that will endure the heaviest traffic of feet on the day of the move. Usually, the places that will need floor protection from dust, dirt, and moisture are the inside area of the outside door of the home and the areas along the exit route from the rooms to that door.
Use pieces of masking tape to secure the plastic bags onto the floor so that they cannot move when somebody steps on them.
Use trash bags to throw away the trash while packing
Needless to say, you can also use garbage bags to throw out the leftovers of packing materials that are likely to accumulate during the packing process.
So, in order to keep your packing stations clear of clutter, keep throwing out the trash regularly using the worst plastic bags you have at that moment while keeping the best ones (large, thick, and strong) for packing.
How to choose the right garbage bags for your move
Bet on high-quality brands of trash bags that you can actually trust.
There are different types of trash bags in the stores so it’s important to know which ones are right for your packing needs.
Buy plastic trash bags of a brand that you know well even though you’ll have to spend a bit more money for them. Stay away from generic garbage bags that can’t possibly meet your quality standards.
Pick the thickest trash bags you can find in the store. You already know that you need strong heavy-duty plastic bags that can withstand heavier loads. Standard kitchen trash bags are around 0.9 mils thick while heavy-duty trash bags will start at 3.0 mils and can go up to 4.0 mils in thickness.
Choose the largest garbage bags available. As a rule of thumb, the strength of plastic bags is closely related to their size, so larger trash bags tend to be more durable as well.
What type of things you should pack in trash bags?
You should only pack soft goods in plastic bags – items that are not fragile in any way and cannot get damaged by the basic protection that plastic bags tend to offer: plain clothes, shoes with flat and soft heels, blankets, pillows, sheets, comforters, towels, socks, and so on. Packing stuffed animals in large and clean trash bags is also a good option.
And now that you know what you should pack in garbage bags, here’s what you should NOT pack in plastic bags: any items that are fragile in nature and any items that have sharp edges that are likely to tear the bags. Also, do not pack books in trash bags – they will be much safer in small cardboard boxes or even better – in travel suitcases.
When you’re organizing a DIY move, then you can choose to pack some of your non-breakables in plastic trash bags to save time and storage space. However, the real question is Will movers move garbage bags? when you’re using professional moving services.
Local movers might agree to transport some of your things in trash bags because of the shorter distance and the less time your items will spend on the road. As long as soft, non-fragile items are packed inside the plastic bags, the movers may be OK with it.
However, cross-country movers are likely to refuse to take any items packed in plastic bags due to the greater distance (hundreds or thousands of miles) and the prolonged delivery time. The risks are just too great so long-distance movers want everything to be packed neatly in strong cardboard boxes for the best protection.
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