You’ve probably heard all your friends talking about how stressful their college packing experience is going, but yours’ doesn’t have to be! Here at Collegeboxes we’ve already narrowed down the tough question of what you should bring to college, so you don’t end up with something with no benefits.
For college dorm room move in, Collegeboxes will help guide you through what items you should bring, buy, or leave behind.
Bring it
Clothes:
Clothes are probably the most important thing to pack for your dorm room. Think of all the amazing outfits you already have! To ensure you won’t bring too many clothes your dresser won’t close, go through and do a closet cleanout and narrow down what you’re bringing. By only bringing what you need, it gives you space for new outfits later!
Don’t know where to start? We’ve got you covered:
- 10 T-shirts/3 long sleeves/3 tank tops
- 2 polos/nice tops
- 1 sweater, 1 sweatshirt, 1 coat (depending on weather)
- 3 pairs of Jeans/2 pairs of sweats/joggers/ 1 pair of dress pants
- 4 shorts
- Enough socks and underwear to feel safe
- 3 sets of pajamas
- 3 pairs of shoes (walking, dress shoes, workout)
This list gives you enough clothes so you’re not spending every weekend in the laundry room, and you’ll still have space for more!
| If you don’t know where to start with how many boxes or what moving supplies you’ll need for all your clothes, we’ve got you covered! In the Collegeboxes Supply Kit you get five boxes, one bonus box, one roll of tape, 10 shipping label pouches, five zip ties, and one marker shipped to you all for the low price of $39.99. |
You don’t have to say goodbye to everything in your current space and knowing what makes your room unique is what you should bring and showcase in your new dorm!
Room Decor:
Whether it’s pictures, baskets, lights, banners, or flags, it can easily be shipped with Collegeboxes. Using Ship to School or Direct Shipping is the most convenient way your items will get to your dorm or apartment safe and secure. Simply pack your items and FedEx will pick them up and ship them to your destination!
First Aid Kit:
Packing a first aid kit with over-the-counter medicine and bandages from home can save you a ton of money in the long run. Plus, it can be personalized! Morning headaches from pulling an all-nighter won’t feel so bad when you’ve got what you need to take care of it, instead of going to the local drug store when you should be resting.
The convenient part about a first aid kit is how small it can be! It can easily fit in most boxes on top of clothes and sheets and shipped to your school with Collegeboxes.
| For more information on what to pack for the essential first aid kit, check out this article here! |
Buy it
Mini Fridge:
Think about this: you already have all your boxes for college packed and a mini fridge takes up double the space and weight of a normal suitcase (around 60 pounds!). Do you really want to struggle to move it across the country?
Mini fridges are a great appliance to have in a dorm room, because of how much money it can save you. You can conveniently order one online or buy one at a local store and have it shipped to your dorm; some colleges will already have one in the dorm room or a rentable option.
All these options save you time, money and an aching back before you move to your dorm. (Nobody understands college student back pain). Some colleges and universities even offer sustainable programs such as Barnard College’s Give and Go Green, which allows students to buy used items from previous students, saving on larger essential items.
Wait, but what about bringing it back home for the summer? With Collegeboxes, the top student storage provider, you don’t have to worry about bringing a fridge back home for the summer. Collegeboxes stores your belongings in a clean, dry, and secure U-Haul storage facility that you can access at any time. Because Collegeboxes is a division of U-Haul, students benefit from U-Haul’s network of more than 1,500 storage facilities across the United States.
| For information on how to properly defrost a minifridge, check out this article here. |
Cleaning Supplies:
You’ll need cleaning supplies for your college living space and there are great deals everywhere! Grabbing the supplies (vacuum, deodorizers, laundry detergent) once you get to college is a no brainer.
If you buy the cleaning supplies at home and bring them with you to college, it’ll only take up more room in your boxes or moving truck and it’s one more thing to carry into your dorm room. Buying them after you arrive at your dorm allows you to avoid any spills or supplies breaking open on the rest of your stuff. It also lets you talk about what supplies you need with your roommate(s) and who will be cleaning what.
Leave it
Printer:
Printers are big, bulky, typically broken, and crazy expensive! Printers are a pain, between connection errors and ink running out quickly (up to $30-$50 per cartridge!). Most won’t work on your school’s Wi-Fi anyways. In a dorm room, they’ll take up more room than you want. And most schools also offer printing services included in your library usage on campus, anyway.
Save your money and get something else you’ll actually use! A bike, skateboard, a computer monitor, noise-cancelling headphones for your noisy roommates.
The TV:
Like many of the items on this list, setting up a TV can be a nightmare in a college dorm. Most dorm rooms don’t have a cable set up, or enough space to even put up a tv. The Solution? Get a monitor!
Monitors are cheap and you can often find one at a thrift store or online seller. A monitor can be a savior when studying, as it allows you to have two screens instead of one! This keeps you more organized and on task. A monitor can also be a TV with a streaming stick or a gaming console!
The wonderful thing about a monitor? If the monitor is small enough it can be put inside of a Collegebox! Make sure to place enough clothes or sheets around it to protect the screen and let Collegeboxes take care of the rest.
Iron & Ironing Board:
These items are time consuming, complicated, and hot! How much time are you going to have to iron your clothes? Most college dorm rooms don’t allow them because of the potential fire hazard.
What you should get instead is a small handheld steamer! Steamers are a great space-saving option for getting wrinkles out of clothes. Make sure to check with your university’s housing policy to see if a steamer is allowed.
Candles:
Most colleges don’t allow candles in dorm rooms as they present a huge fire hazard in a small area. We understand that your favorite scent freshens up the room, but there are easy alternatives to use instead.
For light, there are LED candles that won’t break fire codes. If you care more about the smell, we suggest using a diffuser with essential oils and such. Bringing candles to college will likely get you in trouble with the housing office, and it’s simply not worth the risk with other options available.
You’re Ready to Pack!
With this list, you now have solutions to all your dorm-filled worries, and it will turn your dorm into the ultimate hangout spot. Think about movie nights with microwave popcorn and your nice monitor! A nice smelling dorm with your diffuser, and wrinkle free clothes with your nice steamer! The best part? You can store all these items over the summer with Collegeboxes, and they’ll be right back in your dorm after summer vacation! Packing can be challenging, but you got this!