Sadly, I don't have a garage. But, because they have an additional whole for direct mount into studs in interior walls, I have still found ways to use Rubbermaid FastTrack hooks throughout my house.
Here are a few places the hooks have come in handy for me:
1-Holding mops / stick tools in my laundry room (3 handle S hook)
2- Propping up canvases in my art closet (ladder hooks)
Holding camping chairs in my really little coat closet (hose hook)
Keeping sporting goods off the floor (Multipurpose hook) - this poor tennis racket hasn't seen any court time for quite awhile, so it needs a good resting place!
Jim had done a post awhile back on how the graphic design guys in our office use FastTrack to organize their desk spaces. I thought it might be neat to share a few other photos from our office and how we use both our own products and other great products to keep our spaces neat & tidy around here:
Engineers use Totes and Shelving for keeping their samples organized
The Industrial Designers use little food storage containers to hold up the glass table in their area...I wouldn't expect anything less out of this creative bunch :)
The research & development guys are very tidy, keeping their items neatly tucked away in FastTrack garage cabinets and organizing magazines on a clever rack.
The Commercial Marketing team keeps their samples on shelving as well since their large restaurant-type items won't fit in a small cube!
If you don't know Melissa (Consumer Queen) you should. She writes a great blog about saving money and she reviews products too. She also has a fun Blog Talk Radio show on Thursday nights.
Anyway, a while back Lauren and I told her we'd try to help get her garage organized (now seeing the video I'm a little scared). On Tuesday she sent us a video of her garage so we could get a feel for the situation.
Below is our challenge/her garage. I thought you'd be interested in seeing. Does anyone feel like helping out? She's in Oklahoma.
If you remember, back in January we held the Get Organized contest. There have been multiple posts (see links below) and many people have commented on the great results.
While we were doing the garage makeover we brought in a film crew to document the process (I guess my Flip video camera wasn't considered high enough quality). Just this morning I received the final video file. I hope you enjoy.
The Rubbermaid garage make over has made a big difference all over my house. I've sent some pictures to demonstrate. The first is me standing in my walk in closet. Before there were two totes of gifts I've been collecting for birthday parties, baby showers, etc that took up precious space in our master bedroom closet. Now with the amazing garage makeover there was room for the gifts in the garage.
The second picture is of my craft closet. I went crazy with the label maker you gave me. And the little Rubbermaid stool fits perfectly inside the closet to help me reach the kids crafts that are up high. All my friends agree that a label maker is the perfect gift for me.
As you can see from the third picture my laundry room is free and clear of shoes. I can open my front loading washer without an avalanche of shoes falling off our old shoe rack. Now our shoes (and the dirt that comes with them) stay in the great Rubbermaid cubbies in my "mudroom" section of the garage.
The final picture is of my van which fits with room to spare in the garage. In fact earlier this week when it snowed my husband fit his car in the garage too. That hasn't happened for about 3 years and 2 kids ago.
Wow! Last Thursday and Friday were two very busy days. If you remember, back in January we ran a promotion called the Get Organized contest. To enter you had to upload a photo from a room of your home that needed an organization makeover. We picked a winner at the end of January and last Thursday and Friday we did the makeover.
On Thursday my co-worker Lauren and I, along with professional organizer Carson Tate, CPO®, traveled to Aimee's home (Aimee was the winner) to begin the project.
Just
some of the crew (left to right): Sandy the stylist, Lauren from
Rubbermaid, Aimee the winner, Carson Tate the CPO® and Elliot the
director.
The first order of business was for Carson and Aimee to talk so Carson could understand how the garage was used, what pain points currently existed along with what a successful project would look like. This was where Carson and Aimee discussed the 'zones' of the garage and how everything would be put back once we were done sorting and purging. Thanks to Aimee this was fairly easy because she already had a good grasp of what needed to be done.
Carson and Aimee sort through the contents of her garage.
The next task to occur was the sorting and purging. To sort we put three large colored tarps on the driveway. Each tarp was marked for different types of items. One for items Aimee wanted to keep, one for trash and one for donations. Using these tarps made it very easy to do the high-level sorting / purging.
We moved everything out of the garage onto tarps.
Once the 'keep' items had been identified the next steps was to dive into each and every box and complete a sort/purge at a micro-level. Carson mentioned time and time again that Aimee was great at this step. She was able to quickly identify the items that needed to stay and didn't have a hard time getting rid of clutter she didn't need to keep anymore.
During the sorting and purging process Lauren and I, along with Elliot from Limerick Studios, dove into the installation of the Rubbermaid FastTrack garage organization system. As usual the installation was very simple. Measure and mark the walls for the rail, level & mark the rails, install a few screws and you're done. We installed all of the rails, which were numerous, in just a few hours. Oh... did I mention Elliot and his crew had to film a video during this time too. In addition to the FastTrack rails, hooks and cabinets Aimee also got a couple steel-reinforced resin shelves, a corner tool caddy, a million totes and an outdoor shed.
Carson divided the garage into 'zones'. This was the kid zone.
After the installation was complete, all the sorting and purging was done, and we ate lunch (tortilla wraps and iced tea) we began the process of putting everything back into the garage. Under the direction of Carson the entire crew helped place all the 'keep' items back into their appropriate 'zone'. This was a very quick process as Aimee and Carson had previously identified the 'zones' and what went into these areas.
This was the tools & hardware zone
When all was said and done Aimee and family were super happy. The project was a great success and we are all very proud. (NOTE: I'll post the final video once we have the edit back)
Aimee and family were very happy with the final project. We were all a little tired.
We started by having Aimee take photos of her garage and make a list of the items that are currently stored there. Below are a few photos along with the list she generated.
Aimee's List
Yard equipment including a lawn mower, rakes, shovels, weed wacker, leaf blower, pole trimmer, electric shears, extension cords.
Sports equipment such as balls, tennis rackets, cleats and bike helmets.
Stuff that would be great for a cabinet such as paint, weed killer, motor oil.
Back packs, and coats and gloves that could use hooks to hang on.
A huge Sears hard top car carrier.
Beach chairs, chairs in bags, boogie board.
A Rubbermaid container of pool/beach toys.
An adult bike, 2 kids bikes, a small bike with training wheels, a tricycle and 3 scooters.
Some tools such as drills.
A double jogging stroller that we use every day.
A total gym and a stationary bike (that we’d like unearthed so they are useful).
A large artificial tree in a bag.
2 ladders, a power washer, a small shop vac.
A cooler and a beverage cooler.
A small space heater.
Oh, and a stereo my husband refuses to get rid of.
I’ve started buying in bulk to save money and if I could make space in the garage for food that would be great.
In our back yard we have a Rubbermaid chest that we use for kids toys
Once we received this information from Aimee we setup a call between her and Carson Tate, the Certified Professional Organizer®. The call was about 30 minutes and was lead by Carson. We discussed Aimee's frustrations, how she uses her garage, and most importantly, what success look likes when we're done.
Anyway, the call went really well. We are all really excited to see the finished project. We're aiming to work on the project on February 27th. I'll keep you posted.
How many times have you taken the time to organize your garage, closet, kitchen or other problem area to find that just a few weeks later it's back to it's originally messy state?
I had the same problem too. But I don't have that problem anymore. I've begun to understand the basics of getting organized, and more importantly, staying organized.
Last June I undertook a fairly large project. I decided to makeover my garage. The project took a few weekends with some help from my son but when it was complete I was very excited with the results. The garage looked great and I felt great about the accomplishment. However, I feel even better about it today than I did then.
It's been six months and the garage is STILL ORGANIZED!
The trick to keeping it organized was planning on the front end about how the space was going to be utilized and by whom, clearing the clutter that didn't belong, and most importantly, taking 5 minutes every once in a while to pick up a few items the kids leave laying around. I would list those three things as the most important aspects of getting and staying organized.
I hope these photos give you a little inspiration going into 2009. Remember, you can get and stay organized too.
Way back in July I wrote an entry about an internal marketing contest we held up at Rubbermaid Canada. You can read it or just take a look the part that I’ve copied below to get up to speed:
“We asked employees to send in pictures of their “messy” garage and tell us why they needed a makeover with the Rubbermaid FastTrack® product line. The winner would receive free; design consultation, product and installation from their friendly Canadian marketing department.”
Well a lot things happened since then… I got married, our winner went on vacation and our photographer got extremely busy. But finally, over two months later, we now have the ’before & after’ pictures that say more then any four hundred word blog ever could.
BEFORE
AFTER
I think it’s safe to say that our winner’s garage is a thing of beauty. The system has allowed her to get her items off the floor, eliminate multiple shelving units and work stations and now park two as opposed to zero cars in her garage.
I like to call it ‘Garage synergy.’ So often we have mini attempts to organize our spaces…a little of this and a little of that. The problem with this is that we don’t give any overarching thought to how the system will work together and in a place like the garage we often end up causing more confusion. The Rubbermaid FastTrack program provides the three things you want in a system; shelving, hooks and cabinets. But it delivers these in a cohesive way that takes everything off the ground and allows you to change the layout with the seasons or your moods.
Now I have to admit, ‘Garage’ is my category as Canadian marketing manager, I designed the makeover and actually installed the product with two of my colleagues….needless to say I’m quite proud of the result…..but what do you think? I need an ‘unbiased’ opinion.
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