Crate Hire vs Cardboard Boxes — What's Cheaper on the Gold Coast?
A real cost comparison for a typical 3-bedroom Gold Coast move.
Moving house on the Gold Coast? You need something to pack everything into. You've basically got two options: buying cardboard boxes or hiring reusable plastic crates.
Here's what each option actually costs — including the bits most people don't think about until moving day.
Going cardboard
For a typical 3-bedroom Gold Coast house, you'll need roughly 30–40 cardboard boxes in various sizes. Here's what that costs:
- 30 medium boxes (from Bunnings or a removalist supplier): ~$120–$150
- 10 large boxes: ~$50–$70
- Packing tape (3–4 rolls): ~$15–$20
- Marker pens for labelling: ~$5
- Time spent assembling and taping boxes: 1–2 hours
- Time spent breaking down and disposing: 1+ hours
- Trip to recycling / tip: fuel + time
Total estimated cost: $190–$245 + your time
Hiring crates instead
With Coastal Packing Hire, the same 3-bedroom move looks like this:
- House Pack — 40 heavy-duty 80L crates (2-week hire): $269
- Delivery to your Gold Coast door: included
- Pickup when you're done: included
- Tape: $0 (lids fold shut)
- Assembly time: 0 minutes
- Disposal: nothing to dispose of
Total cost: $269, plus hours of your time saved.
What the price doesn't tell you
Plastic crates also have advantages that cardboard can't match:
- The Gold Coast gets its share of afternoon storms and year-round humidity. Cardboard goes soft; plastic crates don't care.
- Flat lids and uniform size mean they stack perfectly in a car, van, or trailer.
- Heavy items like books and kitchenware won't punch through the bottom.
- No cardboard dust, no old box smell, no insects hitching a ride from second-hand boxes. They turn up clean and ready to go.
- We collect the empties — nothing ends up at the tip or in your recycling bin.
Bottom line
For a typical Gold Coast move, plastic crate hire costs about the same as cardboard — and saves you hours of assembly, taping, breaking down, and disposal time. Add free delivery and pickup to that, and cardboard starts to look like a lot of hassle for not much saving.
Done with cardboard? Get a free quote from Coastal Packing Hire and get your crates delivered to your Gold Coast door.