Boston Movers Blog

Marathon Moving Company wants your move to go as smoothly as possible. If you have decided to pack your own belongings, we would like to offer the following packing tips to help ensure a safe arrival of all your possessions.

• Use professional packing materials as these will save you time and ensure the safety of your goods.
• Make certain all cartons are taped securely, top and bottom. Use carton sealing tape and not masking tape or duct tape.
• Label all fragile boxes and stack them separately from your other cartons.
• Label all cartons. Cartons should be labeled for contents and destination on two sides of the box to make it easy for your movers to identify where each carton should go.
• Tightly secure the lids to any containers that contain liquids.
• Leave clothes and light linens in bureau drawers. Your movers will be able to move your bureaus full. Any breakables such as perfume bottles or costume jewelry should be removed and packed into a carton.
• Small, 2 drawer file cabinets can be moved full. Four drawer filing cabinets should have the bottom two drawers full. All lateral style cabinets must be completely emptied.
• Empty desk drawers. Desks often need to be turned on their side to get through doorways and loose items may fall out and be lost.
• Make a list of all items you will need for a few days prior to and immediately following your move. These items should be separated and labeled “DO NOT MOVE”. These items should include: soap, towels, toothpaste, toilet paper, cereals, bowls, plates and utensils, cups, sheets, blankets, and immediately needed clothes.
• Pack heavy items in small cartons, i.e. books, records and canned goods, etc.
• Fill all cartons to the top as half-filled cartons tend to crush. Do not, overfill cartons because rounded top cartons are hard to stack.
• Pack all items snugly into cartons using unprinted newspaper for fragile items. Use crushed paper to fill any gaps in cartons to prevent items from shifting

Your largest and heaviest items should be secured against the wall that separates the driver from the rest of the truck. These heavy items should be placed in the truck first, secured by rope. Use furniture pads between any two items that might be touching. Secure any lighter items by using heavier items on their opposite sides.

Long items go on next, mostly up on their longest sides or edges. Loading large-sized mattresses go up against the side walls next, secured by rope. Be sure to use a mattress bag to ensure that the mattress isn't damaged during the move. Other long items to secure include sofas, table tops, long pictures and mirrors. The rest of the furniture should now go on the truck, arranged neatly and orderly, and up against the sides of the truck where possible. Again, moving pads are your friends here.

Heavy boxes are next on the list, arranged to form rows on the floor of the truck. Be careful to leave room to walk, and don’t stack the heavy boxes high enough to damage the ones on the bottoms. Also, never stack heavy boxes on top lighter ones. Follow those with your lighter boxes, and finally awkward items that didn’t fall into the other categories, secured with heavy twine and moving blankets.

Following this order should make your move more orderly and keep damage and stress to a minimum. As always our movers will be there to help you pack the truck should you need help doing so. Be sure to contact us should you have any questions regarding moving and we'll be happy to help.