Shipping Container Buying Guide: What You Need To Know

The intermodal shipping container is truly the building block of the logistics world. Durable, reliable, and almost infinitely versatile, these steel boxes make it possible for goods to traverse land and sea. Owing to that durability and versatility, you may find that you’re in the market for containers yourself. Whether they end up stationary on your premises or continue to transport goods, a new or used container could be a highly useful addition to your business. In this guide to what you need to know about buying a shipping container, we’ll explore the dimensions, integrity, and flooring of shipping containers, along with some advice on how you can find the containers you need.

Know the Container Sizes

While a unit as strictly utilitarian as a shipping container seems to be a one-size-fits-all solution, they do come in more than one size. To stay within your budget, make sure that containers are neither too small nor too large for your needs.

The smallest container, the 10’, is ten feet long, eight feet wide, and 8.6 inches high. It is a specialized unit with very limited availability throughout the world. Next is the 20’ standard container—perhaps the most iconic model to any layperson who has passed a railyard or port. Bearing the same width and height, these containers measure twenty feet long on the exterior and 19’5’’ on the inside. The standard 20’ container weighs in at 4,850 pounds of resilient steel and can take on an additional 62,350 pounds of contents. If this doesn’t offer the necessary capacity, you can double up on length a second time with 40’ standard containers. No matter their length, the floors of these containers all undergo testing to ensure they can handle loads of up to 16,000 pounds.

Whether it’s the 10’, 20’, or 40’, all standard containers feature the same width and height. When an interior height of just under 8’ is insufficient, you may choose to upgrade to the 40’ “high cube” unit. This model boasts an extra foot of interior and exterior height. If you’re planning to store goods that need that extra clearance or you plan on refashioning containers into an application where that extra headroom is valuable, the high cube, while not geometrically cubic, is the ideal size for you.

Container Grades

A shipping container that doesn’t protect its contents from the elements doesn’t do its job. Unwanted airflow can degrade some contents, and a container that lets rainwater in may as well not even be there at all. That’s why it’s important to ascertain that any pre-owned container you’re interested in has either “cargo-worthy” certification or “wind and watertight” grading. Similar but not the same, these statuses both confirm the high quality of containers.

New and Cargo-Worthy

For a container to attain cargo-worthy status, it must pass inspection from a licensed maritime surveyor, whose positive assessment will deem that a container is fit for overseas shipping. If you expect to use your container to ship goods overseas, you’ll need a cargo-worthy certification. While all new containers are cargo-worthy, not all cargo-worthy containers are new—containers can have faded paint, a small but visible amount of rusting or denting along the ceiling and walls, and a negligible amount of floor damage, yet remain fit for shipping. While a container’s new status is fleeting, a container can remain cargo-worthy with adequate care and regular maintenance.

Wind and Watertight

One step down from cargo-worthy is “wind and watertight,” or WWT status. A container that is wind and watertight doesn’t let high winds or water damage a container’s contents. Like a cargo-worthy container, it’s fit for the traditional storage and modification that most container buyers are after, but without cargo-worthy certification, you won’t be able to ship it safely—surveyors believe WWT containers have incurred too much rust, too many dents and scratches, and too much floor damage to keep using for cargo purposes. As long as you’re not in the shipping business yourself, you’re in luck—a WWT container often has everything you need at a lower price compared to its cargo-worthy counterpart.

As-Is

What you need to watch out for is any container sold “as-is,” lacking either designation. Here, the sellers can guarantee nothing—critical levels of rust, significant floor damage, and malfunctioning doors are all common to containers that resellers offer as-is. They’re certainly not fit for storage or conversion, meaning you’ll have to get them up to snuff on your own. Buyer beware when it comes to these.

Floor Condition

With some retaining their original material while owners have replaced and reinforced others, the floors of used shipping containers vary greatly. A standard container floor consists of steel undergirding beneath a one and one-eighth-inch layer of marine-grade plywood. Though the word “plywood” conjures up images of low-quality lumber, the composite that shipping containers use is typically a resilient tropical hardwood, one that manufacturers have treated and waterproofed before installing. This flooring can take a surprising amount of weight and be none the worse for wear—forklifts and other heavy equipment can enter and exit a container without doing damage.

Getting a Container to You

The final aspect of what you need to know from a shipping container buying guide is the final phase of the process—how it gets to you. Shipping containers are no strangers to travel. These units can rack up thousands of miles, and if their walls could talk, they’d have stories to tell. However, when it comes time to buy steel storage containers, you want them to arrive as quickly as possible from as nearby as possible. With 32 depot sites located around the country, and fabrication centers located in Houston and Chicago, Container Management uses its nationwide distribution network to bring high-quality new and pre-owned shipping containers to you with ease. Once you’ve ascertained the quality of your purchase, ensuring quick and easy transit is the most important thing you can do. Our firm can help you do it.