Are There Shipping Containers For Sale Near Me?
When I order a container, where will it come from? Obviously part of the answer depends on where you are located. But a huge part depends on the network of shipping ports and rail ports around the US.
Containers do not linger in the port
Almost all shipping containers are manufactured in China. So the real answer is obviously China.
But what about the box you’re buying? Most people want to make sure that their container comes from the closest spot to them in order to save on trucking. That makes sense and often will be the case.
But the supply side of containers is a little different. Shipping lines bring containers into specific cities throughout the US. You can guess a lot of them: Long Beach, Calif.; Newark, NJ; Oakland, Calif.; Miami, Fla. Those big ports are the first big place containers enter the US. And so, it is also one of the first places containers are available for sale.
As containers move by rail inland, more cities become sources of container sales: Chicago, Atlanta, Columbus, etc. As containers come in with goods and are emptied, they are stored to be used again. Containers get reused for 11-15 years in general. (One-trip/”new” containers are an exception to this rule.) So as one load gets emptied out, they come into one of these cities, is checked over for damage and stored until something is ready to be put in it and shipped out again. That checking and storage all happens in port cities and cities with container rail ramps. When a container is ready for sale, it will come out of one of these cities. From there they go to a variety of different container companies for rentals, sales, modification projects and a whole host of other uses.
Where does this mean for the container you’re about to buy? Well, you may find a local container vendor down the street from you who got a container from one of these cities. You may find company that will sell containers they were using for themselves and are ready to part with. But one way or another, your container came from one of these container cities.
