How to pack floor standing speakers for shipping


One of the things I frequently see are people saying that they cannot ship their floor standing loudspeakers and must have local pickup. That shrinks your potential buyer pool to almost nothing. Your speakers sit for months and years, and when you do sell them, you get pennies on the dollar for what you paid for them.

 

I recently moved to Hawaii from the mainland and had to pack my custom made loudspeakers, which are fine furniture. Here's how I did it and you can too. You're going need the following materials found at Home Depot.

 

- furniture wrap. It looks like a giant roll of Saran Wrap.

- Bubble wrap. Get the kind with big bubbles.

- Packing popcorn

 

Next you're going to go to a place that sells packing cartons. Many long term storage companies will sell packing materials. Get wardrobe cartons. They are very thick and strong cardboard, and typically about 5 feet tall.

 

Step 1: Wrap your loudspeaker in the furniture wrap. Go around several times.

Step 2: Wrap your loudspeaker in at least a 2" layer of bubble wrap.

Step 3: Layer the bottom of your wardrobe carton with:

-> 1" layer bubble wrap

-> 1" layer packing popcorn

-> 1" layer bubble wrap

 

Put your wrapped loudspeaker in the carton and fill with packing popcorn. Fill above that with layers of packing popcorn and bubble wrap.

 

Assuming that your speaker is not 5 feet tall, using a box cutter, cut the top of the carton to fold over the loudspeaker and seal up.

 

If you've got a loudspeaker that is worth $4000 or more, than instead of getting only $500 for it like you eventually will, or worse, give it to your kid for his college dorm room, then it's well worth it to pack it up this way.

128x128russbutton

Never had a problem selling locally or shipping in the original boxes strapped to a pallet, shipped freight.

 

$75 worth of material at Home Depot.  Skill Saw and a drill + wood screws. Purpose built to size.   Speakers always arrive in perfect condition.  The creating is well worth the effort.  Can't put a price on sleeping well at night. 😁

 

 

I'm never afraid to ship and I generally quote my prices shipped.  

But I never try to convince someone who won't ship that they should.  first, they may not package the item well.  second if something does happen, then you are in a bad situation.

Jerry

@zufan  see the progression of my virtual system for that answer.  My end game system is nearing completion, and then there will be changes no more.  Here is the first stage as the speakers are being built.  Delivery at the end of April.  I'm very excited.  

@bigtwin Are you getting a set of the Roger West electrostatic loudspeakers?

Nice job of getting the Tritons ready for shipment.  The point of my post was to encourage people selling speakers like that, so that it really is possible to pack and ship them. 

What inspired me was a set of SEAS Thor loudspeakers done as a DIY project.  The seller was offering them for $800 to local buyers only.  The kit costs $2200 and uses the same basic drivers that the Joseph Audio Perspective2 ($13,000) uses.  Were the seller to be able to pack and ship them, he'd have a much better chance of finding a buyer.

dill wrote:

Never had a problem selling locally or shipping in the original boxes strapped to a pallet, shipped freight.

Agreed. However, many of us city dwellers do not have the space for storing the original boxes and must resort to more creative measures.

(Stated by someone who has just purchased new speakers and is anxious about tossing the boxes.)