The Movers.com Blog

Stacks of old carboard boxes getting ready to start life anew

Is there any object more representative of a move than the cardboard box? These simple, brown containers are definitely the unsung here of anyone’s moving process. They are obviously important to us at the Movers.com team, as they are referenced in almost all of our guides and blog entries.

Since joining Movers.com, I have probably spent more time thinking about cardboard boxes than I have in my whole life combined. But how much do we really know about them? I made it my goal to find out everything possible about the cardboard box.

After doing my research, I learned several interested facts about the cardboard box. Did you know that Martin Luther wrote his famous 95 Theses on a piece of cardboard? Or that on the Apollo 11 space mission, the astronauts ripped apart a cardboard box to make repairs to the shuttle’s bathroom? Or that if it weren’t for a cardboard box, Bill and Hillary Clinton never would have met?

Okay, maybe I made those things up, but I had to draw you in somehow; the real story behind the cardboard box isn’t as exciting.

The cardboard used for making moving boxes goes by the proper name “corrugated fiberboard.” Corrugated fiberboard was first used as a packaging material in 1871, when it was wrapped around glass bottles. In 1890, paper bag maker Robert Gair accidentally cut through one of his fiberboard bags. He then realized that his paper bags could be cut and folded in a certain way, resulting in a light, yet sturdy, carton. Thus, the cardboard box was born.

By the early 20th century, the cardboard box had become the shipping container of choice. It was lighter than the prevalent wooden crates and caused less damage to the goods.

Over the next decades, various improvements were made to keep the cardboard box fun and exciting. It now comes in a variety of colors, thicknesses, strengths, surface treatments, and other options. Currently, there are plans underway to make cardboard cell phones as well as cars that run on old cardboard boxes. Kidding.

No matter what type of cardboard box you have, it is manufactured in the same way. Pine trees are chopped down and ground up, leaving a pile of wood chips. The chips are then cooked in a soup of sodium hydroxide and sulfates, which turn them into pulp. The pulp is then mixed with some recycled materials and then formed, dried, and made into rolls of paper. Finally, this paper gets corrugated and ends up glued between two pieces of liner paper, and you have a giant sheet of cardboard. The cardboard is then printed, creased, scored, cut, sealed, etc. until it forms a box.

There are several styles of boxes, each with their own intriguing name: Half-Slotted Container, Five Panel Folder, Full Overlap Box, and Partial Telescope Box. The box that is most familiar to us, and the kind most used for moving, is the plain old Regular Slotted Container, or RSC as it is known on the streets.

A cardboard box has a pretty long lifespan and can be used again and again for moving and storing your things or for a variety of other uses. However, each box will reach its expiration date at some point or another. Instead of throwing them out with the rest of your trash, cardboard boxes should be recycled.

The recycling process entails placing the old cardboard into vats of hot water, where all extra materials, such as tape and staples, are removed. The cardboard is then made into a pulp, which can be used to manufacture a variety of paper products: tissues, toilet paper, paper towel, printer paper, and even new cardboard boxes. You may be surprised, as I was, to learn that 70% of cardboard boxes are recovered and reused.

It really is remarkable how useful a simple cardboard box can be. From carrying your things when you move to being remade into something you blow your nose with, the cardboard box has quite an interesting life.