How to Organize a Chest Freezer

Want to know how to organize a chest freezer so you actually know what’s in it and can get to it all easier? Then check out my simple solution for the best way to organize a chest freezer.

The best thing about having an organized freezer is that you can stock up at the grocery store when there are sales! Sometimes, we buy so much food that we have to make extra space by freezing some of the items. Organizing a chest freezer or a deep freezer is a great way to have a full freezer with food that is in easy reach.

I don’t know about y’all, but I live in Texas.  Hunting, fishing, ranching…we all have deep freezers, and they are fairly well stocked, most of the time.

Well, I’ve been on a major kick this year to simplify and get organized in every aspect of my life because doing so saves me time and money!

So after I got done figuring out how to clean a deep freezer, I wanted a simple process that would save me time from digging around in a bottomless pit of frozen food with blue fingers, trying to figure out what is chicken and what is pork.

Organizing a deep freezer saves me money and makes me a better, more efficient shopper!  I am no longer buying multiples of things we don’t need, only because I can’t see that we already have them!

So, today’s simple advice is all about organizing a chest freezer – just one more simple step to a more organized life and extra money in your pocket!

How to Organize a Chest Freezer

Most deep freezers are just a big hole, with no easy way to place food, except to pile it in there. It’s great that they have enough space, but having food on the very bottom means that it’s a black hole that you’ll likely never dig down into. 

What I did was place “like” things together, as well as strategically group the items that we use the most so they would be easy to get to like so:

Chest Freezer Organizer

However, if you want to organize a chest freezer even better, look into some chest freezer organizers. You can get all sorts of different baskets and bins online and get some ideas for how you want to do it.

Having certain storage areas in your freezer is a good way to separate different types of foods. Large freezers will have more room but a small chest freezer is still a good use of the space. Your best bet is to create chest freezer space with metal baskets or stackable containers. That way, you can create a chest freezer organization system that the entire family can use.

Plastic bins are also a perfect way to make a small space feel bigger. With a little planning, you can create a layering system that creates an organized chest freezer. All that extra freezer space will be perfect for even more storage bins and will help to give you easy access to the contents of your freezer.

Deep Freezer Inventory List

Here’s the real key – make an inventory list of everything as it goes back into the freezer!

I made a list on paper at first, but then realized it wasn’t practical.  The paper would get lost, or torn, or stuffed into the freezer with everything else, never to be seen again until the next time I cleaned it…so I had to find a more permanent, more workable solution.

I bought these inexpensive, easy to use, magnetic dry-erase boards online at Amazon:

After making my inventory, I transferred all the info to the dry-erase board, which is affixed to the freezer with magnets.

Now, my entire inventory is at my fingertips, and each time we remove an item from the freezer, we can either erase it, or do my recommendation instead – leave it there, but mark a line through it so you’ll see what you’ve used in case you want to add it to a future shopping list.

Speaking of shopping list, you’ll find another dry-erase board here, on my refrigerator, being used for just that purpose!  I love this, because my refrigerator and pantry are right next to each other, so every time we use an item or are getting close to the end of something like the mustard or butter, etc., we can easily add it to the list.

When I’m ready to go to the store, I take a picture of the list with my phone, then erase the list so we can start fresh and not waste time and money by duplicating my purchase of items like I have done unnecessarily in the past, just because I didn’t actually know what we had.

So, there’s the long and short of it. Clean out your deep freezer, inventory your items, use a deep freezer organizer, and create a list that you can update.  Not only will you save time and money, but you’d be amazed at the things you find in the bottom of your deep freezer.

T-bones for dinner, anyone?!