The term garage storage refers to any type of storage used in the garage, be it shelves, plastic storage bins, lockable ceiling mounted compartments, or storage work benches. But when we refer to garage storage systems, this modifier infers we are looking at how the storage components fit together as a whole, not just as individual parts. Simple, right?

To this end, garage storage systems are designed as an overall storage solution for your garage, not just a place to store old books or tools, but a place to store everything that belongs in the garage.

And that is actually a key component of what it means to design working garage storage systems. I’ll say it again: a place to store everything that belongs in the garage. Or to say it another way, everything that is stored in the garage needs to have a specific place it is to be stored. This is not so much as garage storage system principle as it is a principle of storage and organization in general. When every object has a place to go, then clutter is non-existent. Clutter and junk only exist in the garage (and elsewhere in the home, such as the closet), when there’s no place to put it.

This means when sizing up your garage storage options, we first need to identify what sort of objects are going to be put in the garage. For most people, we’d want to cross reference a list that might look like this:

• The Family Car (maybe)
• Lawnmower and gas container
• Tools for maintaining the lawn and the yard, such as rakes, trimmers
• Lawncare chemicals and bottles
• Painting tools, paint buckets, spray paints
• Sports Equipment and Sport Gear
• Bikes and Bicycle Stands and Racks
• Hobby items and tools, such as wood working equipment or arts and crafts equipment
• New Car Parts and related items such as oil containers, old oil, oil rags
• Broken or Old Car Parts
• Old Toys
• Extra Clothes
• Magazines and Books
• Storage Boxes – Cardboard (no!) or Plastic (better)
• Extra Household Furniture
• Old Mattresses, Captains Bed, or Bed Frames
• Extra Or Broken Book Shelves and Cabinets
• …And Lots of Other Random Stuff.

Before jumping into the game of buying storage items and trying to stack things away, you’ll save yourself a lot of time and effort by first:

1. Cleaning Out Your Garage.
This means sweeping the floor and throwing out trash and other stuff that’s obviously junk.

2. Getting Rid of As Much As Possible.
Hold a yard sale, give stuff away, throw it up on Craigslist, and if you must – just trash it. But don’t hold on to anything you don’t use. Have you touched it in the last year? Why are you keeping it then?

3. Now Assess How To Store What’s Left!

At this point when we get to assess what’s left and how to store it is when you should look into what specific garage storage system items you’d like to spend your money on. Once you know what’s actually going into garage storage, it’s much easier to seek out relevant storage items. Map out either mentally or on paper how you might store your items and where you would store them if you had the necessary shelves. Cross reference this with your storage budget and then with the cost of the actual items. Once you’ve got this figured out, it’s only a matter of buying and install the necessary storage items and placing your belongings into them. At that point you’ll have a working garage storage system.