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Shopping for cheap plastic bins for books? When it comes to classroom storage, nothing beats colorful plastic containers for versatility, durability, and practicality. But what features are important to look for when you buy storage bins for the classroom? Let’s take a look.

1. A range of useful colors

In the classroom, colors are useful for organizing and communicating, especially with younger students. Even older students however can find color-coding helpful for sorting books, lab equipment, or other supplies.

For this reason, you should consider shopping for plastic bins for classroom books in a number of different bold colors. If you need particular colors, then make sure that the bins you are thinking about purchasing really are those colors. Sometimes there are divergences between the colors pictured and the actual colors of bins, depending on the manufacturer, seller, and website.

2. Durability

Plastic storage containers for the classroom can take quite a lot of abuse from students. As such, you should only buy bins which are high in quality, made of rugged plastic that will not crack or warp. Bins which are drop-resistant are ideal.

3. Handles for gripping

Another great feature for classroom bins or books is handles for gripping. These are helpful both for you and for the kids in your class—especially if the bins will contain heavy textbooks. Make sure that the handles on the bins you are thinking about buying will work for small hands if you have younger children who will be carrying them around.

4. Size

How big are the plastic containers you are considering? Will they be large enough for your needs? Measure the dimensions of your textbooks and think about how many books you want to be able to put in each of the containers.

Think about weight too—you can only put so many heavy books into a single bin before you need another one, even if there is extra room inside. So you do not necessarily need a huge bin, even with large textbooks. You just may need to buy more bins than you expected.

5. Reasonable price

One more consideration is cost. Plastic containers for books should not be overly expensive. Oftentimes you are stuck buying supplies for your classroom on your own dollar since the school will not approve the list of materials you need. Going with the cheapest bins you find however is often not a good idea, since you will end up sacrificing in the durability department.

You will notice one thing I did not claim here is that you need bins specifically designed for holding books. Plastic containers developed for textbooks in particular can be useful, but they are not a necessity. Plenty of general purpose plastic bins can fill the same role. So long as they are durable and the right size and colors for your needs, they should work.

That is really all you need to know in order to shop for plastic bins for books for your classroom. Once you have a system in place, it will make classroom organization a lot easier!