A properly organized pantry can be a thing of convenience that keeps everything at your fingertips. Whereas a disorganized pantry can be a constant source of frustration that leaves you wasting precious minutes looking for what you want, while the rest of supper starts to burn on the stove.
In this article, we’ll take a look at some creative, yet simple pantry organization hacks.
Dedicate A Shelf Just For Snacks
Sometimes you just want to grab a quick snack or give your kids a little bag of chips for their cold lunch. Dedicating a single shelf just for popular snack items lets you quickly find what you want and take it with you on the go.
If necessary, you can install simple adjustable shelf dividers to help keep bags and boxes from intermixing or wasting space. Depending on the age of your children, you might want to have two shelf areas. One up high with the “Guilty Pleasure” snacks and one down low where you can keep more healthy snacks. That way you kids can help themselves to the good stuff, but you can still retain control of when they get to have a taste of junk food.
Use Dividers For Canned Goods
One of the problems with canned goods is that most cans are the same height. This makes it all too easy for the petite diced tomatoes you want to hide behind an ordinary can of refried beans. You end up writing petite diced tomatoes on your shopping list, only to find out later that you now have more than you wanted. Of course, as you push cans in, they tend to spread out and intermix.
Putting dividers on the shelf for canned goods lets you keep tomatoes with tomatoes, beans with beans, and corn with corn. That way when you need it, you can find it at a glance, and you also have a better idea of your inventory when you write up the weekly shopping list.
Add Lazy Susan’s To The Corners
The dark corners of a pantry end up being a great place for things to hide. Here again, you face the frustration of not being able to find what you want, while also risking buying more than what you need.
Installing a heavy-duty Lazy Susan to the corners of your pantry lets you rotate through your options quickly to help you find what you’re looking for. When it’s done right, it even looks cool.
Use Pants Racks To Hold Tablecloths
If you are the type of person who has a tablecloth for every occasion, then you might be challenged with finding a proper place to keep them all. The last thing you want to do is fold them uptight to be stored in a tote only to be creased and wrinkled the next time you want to use them.
Simple pants rack like you would find in your walk-in closet lets you gently drape a tablecloth to keep them available at a moment’s notice, while also keeping them insight. Depending on the shape and size of your pantry, you might be able to keep four or five of your favorite tablecloths on hand, year-round.
Use A Jewelry Insert To Keep Utensils Organized
A lot of people have multiple sets of utensils. The everyday stuff that lives in the kitchen drawer 365-days out of the year, and then the good silverware that needs to be stored away someplace safe. For good silverware, you can install jewelry inserts to keep everything in place and looking flawlessly for those times when you might want to show it off, even if you aren’t going to use it.
Repurpose Shoe Cubbies As A Wine Rack
Some people are very passionate about collecting wine or just like to keep their favorite vintages on hand. Unfortunately, manufacturers have caught on to this, and many sell wine racks at exorbitant prices.
If you are a little handy, or you know someone who is, you can easily repurpose a very inexpensive shoe rack as a wine rack on a pantry shelf. If décor matters, you could even paint it to match or spray paint with a flat or hammered finish to give it a wine cellar look.
Install Sliding Baskets For Bagged Items
Bagged items tend to be difficult for the store. They rarely fit tightly together, and when stacked tend to tumble over into a messy pile. Bags just don’t work and play well on shelves.
Sliding baskets can be installed onto rails that let them hang from the underside of shelves. A wire basket lets you see what’s in it, and you can grab it out at a moment’s notice, simply by sliding the entire basket out just like a drawer.
Adjustable Height Shelves For Special Items
It’s happened to all of us a time or two, where you go to put in a tall bottle of ketchup and somehow it’s just half an inch taller than the shelf. So, you end up laying it flat, which takes up an incredible amount of space for something that’s supposed to be convenient and simple.
Installing adjustable shelves in your pantry lets you quickly adjust each shelf to your preference. You can then create a tall shelf or two for bottles of ketchup and salad dressing. Then make another shelf for shorter canned goods like mushrooms and mandarin oranges. Not only does this give everything its own custom space, but it also promotes organization when putting the groceries away, while also maximizing the space being used throughout the pantry.
Install Under Cabinet Lighting
A lot of pantries tend to have overhead lighting which lets you see what’s on the face of each shelf. Yet the cans, boxes, and bags at the back of the shelf often lurk in the darkness. LED lights can often be installed under shelves that turn on with a single tap. This helps you see what you have in the back of the shelf to help you rotate items before they expire. Some of these LED light fixtures are battery-operated, so you don’t have to worry about wiring them yourself.
