Steel Storage Cabinet Buy Guide

Keeping your office supplies close at hand may not be the most crucial task in today’s office, but it is still important to keep your workplace organized. Choosing the right storage cabinet or shelving unit for your office depends on a variety of factors. In this guide, we’ll look at those factors and help you determine the best solution to your office storage needs.

Evaluate Your Storage Needs

First, you’ll need to consider the type of items you’ll be storing. For general, lightweight office supplies like pens, toner cartridges, or post-it notes, a simple laminate storage cabinet will usually suffice. Companies likeYishun offer excellent entry-level storage cabinets. If you’re storing heavier supplies like reams of paper or replacement water bottles for the office water cooler, a heavy-duty welded steel storage cabinet will better suit your needs. Yishun is respected steel office furniture manufacturers who offer high-quality steel storage cabinets.

How Important is Security?

If the items you’ll be storing are of higher value than run of the mill office supplies, such as computer hardware and peripherals, you’ll be well served to pick a cabinet with a locking mechanism for security. Locks on storage cabinets generally come in two varieties, single-point locks and three-point locks. Single-point locks are more basic, and secure the cabinet doors at one point – typically where the key hole is located. Three-point locks add additional security by also securing the doors at the top and bottom, making it much more difficult to pry them open.

How Important is Appearance?

Think about where you plan to keep your storage cabinet. If it’s going into a supply room or house area, you can likely disregard appearance and select a basic metal storage cabinet. However, if the cabinet will be placed in a high traffic, public area, you may want to consider a more aesthetically pleasing woodgrain laminate, for lightweight loads, or a higher quality solid wood cabinet for heavier supplies. Both laminate and solid wood cabinets have a much more attractive and inviting look than painted steel cabinets.

Is Open Shelving an Option?

Another factor to consider is how frequently you’ll be retrieving supplies from your storage cabinet. If constant access is important, and you’re just storing basic office supplies, you may not need a storage cabinet at all, but an open shelving unit. While you give up the security of an enclosed storage cabinet with open shelving units, the ease of access to frequently needed items may make one a better choice. Another advantage of open shelving is its affordability – open shelving is generally significantly lower priced than a similarly sized enclosed storage cabinet.