We've been using used wax produce boxes for harvest and for bringing the shares to town for the past two seasons. They're free when you can find them at the local coops and they last for a few months if treated well. When they fall apart they can't be recycled, although I understand that Portland food business that are using commercial composting can now put them in the compost. Even though they're free, there are some definitely annoyances with them. They're a bit flimsy, especially after a few uses. They have gaps and have to be folded and unfolded to store well. They're not standard sizes so we spend time finding the right ones, and then figuring out how to stack them. My partner (in life, not on the farm) complains about the way they look sitting on our porch, and I admit they're not beautiful. I've been telling her for two years that I was going to build wooden boxes. It turns out that these Ikea boxes were almost as cheap as buying the wood I needed to build the boxes and they were pre cut so they saved quite a bit of labor.
I made a linoleum cut to print our name on the boxes (in hopes that we don't loose them, or at least if we do it'll be some advertising in some random spot). Yesterday while it was pouring rain Kji and I printed up the boxes and put them together. We'll use these to hold the bags at the drop sites so look for them there. After it poured rain all morning we did head out to the farm to check on the greenhouse, which was just fine, and to look at, of all things, some tweaks to our irrigation system. This week, believe it or not, is usually the first week of irrigation season - not this year, but soon maybe.
The boxes look so very professional, good work!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Kylie. They definitely make things look neater at the pick up sites and it's always nice to get rid of the background stress of finding the right wax box, then finding others that will stack with them, then making sure none of the bottoms fall out. Ah, wax boxes, really amazing and cheap, but such a pain.
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