10ft Shipping Containers
Side access is pinched, the setback leaves nothing to manoeuvre in, or all that is needed is a lockable spot for the mower, an air compressor and a wall of hand tools.
Alice Springs, NT
Shipping containers Alice Springs
There is no short way into Alice Springs. It is about fifteen hundred kilometres down the Stuart from Darwin and roughly the same again up from Adelaide, so whichever direction a container comes from it is a multi-day linehaul before anybody so much as thinks about a crane. The upside is that the Stuart is sealed the whole way and the corridor is busy, so a container bound for the Alice is not an exotic request. It is a matter of getting it onto a truck already making the trip, and that is mostly a question of notice.
- Delivered from
- our Darwin depot, roughly fifteen hundred kilometres straight down the Stuart Highway, or an eastern states unit carted through Adelaide and up the same road from the south
- Typical lead time
- Usually 2-4 weeks from order to on the ground
- Usual truck
- Side loader or crane truck for 40ft and for anything lifted over a fence; tilt-tray for 10ft and 20ft into town blocks and the industrial estates
Every enquiry answered within one business day.You hear back from a person, not an autoresponder. Enquiries that land on a weekend are answered the next business day.
The local picture, briefly.
What the containers do here
Around Alice Springs we deliver containers for swag, trailer and camping gear storage for tour operators shutting down between seasons, staging and resupply storage for remote community stores and contractors working out of town, secure storage for art centres holding stock and materials, parts and workshop storage across the Ciccone, Arunga Park and Brewer Estate industrial areas, fodder, fencing and machinery storage on the pastoral country out along the Plenty, Tanami and Larapinta, site stores on remote build packages, and household storage for people posted into town before a house comes free.
What the site has to allow for
Alice Springs is a town shaped by a gap in a mountain range, and that geography shows up in delivery planning. Heavitree Gap is the only way in or out to the south for road and rail, and it is a genuine pinch point: two lanes, the river beside it, and when the Todd runs after heavy rain the road through it can close. It rarely lasts long, but it can strand a truck on the wrong side of town for a day. North of the gap the town is comfortable. Braitling, Larapinta, Gillen and the newer parts of Sadadeen have wide streets and driveways a rigid can get square to, and the industrial ground at Ciccone, Arunga Park and out at Brewer Estate is exactly what you would want: flat, hard, and used to trucks. The Old Eastside streets are tighter, with river gums over the road, narrow verges and services on the frontage, so a crane over the fence is often the sensible call there. Ground across the district is generally very good. Compacted red gravel and gibber carry a container without complaint and often need very little under them. Two exceptions: the sandy country along the Todd and the other creek lines, which is loose and deep, and any pad graded in the last few months and never compacted. The other planning factor is heat and light. Through summer the useful working window is the morning, because steel that has been in the sun since seven is unmanageable by lunchtime. In winter you get the reverse problem, with frost on the ground at dawn and a cold start. Send photos of the street, the run in and the spot itself, tell us whether the last leg is sealed, and we will tell you which truck is coming and roughly when.
Grade moves the price more than size does, and it is what decides whether a unit is sold watertight — the full rundown is on the grades page.
The range
Containers we deliver to Alice Springs
Priced with delivery to your address - one call, one number.
20ft Shipping Containers
There is about seven metres of straight, reasonably level ground for it to sit on, and you would rather not discover in half a year that the bigger box was the answer.
40ft Shipping Containers
You have the space, the approach is genuinely open, and the aim is the largest amount of storage per dollar spent that anybody sells.
Alice Springs
Fifteen hundred kilometres either way
The Alice sits almost exactly halfway between Darwin and Adelaide, which is either a curse or a convenience depending on how you look at it. It is a curse because there is no short run, no local depot around the corner, and no possibility of a same-week delivery for somebody who rings on a Friday having forgotten. It is a convenience because the Stuart Highway is one of the busiest freight corridors in the country and there is nearly always something moving in one direction or the other. A container that can wait for the right truck travels far more sensibly than one that cannot.
What that means in practice is notice. Two to four weeks is the usual window, and the customers who get the best of that range are the ones who ring early with a window rather than a deadline. Batching matters too: if a job needs two or three units, ordering them as a group gets them onto one run. And getting the specification right before the container leaves is worth real money out here, because sending a wrong unit back down the Stuart is not a small correction. Ring 1300 467 776 with the address, the job and what is going inside, and we will quote the container and the cartage as a single figure with nothing waiting on the invoice.
On the ground
A thirty degree swing between afternoon and dawn
Central Australia does something to a steel box that coastal towns do not. A forty degree February afternoon followed by a night that drops into the teens, or a twenty degree July day followed by a frost, means the container is expanding and contracting hard every twenty-four hours, and any moisture inside it condenses on the roof and walls overnight and drips back down. People call it container rain and it surprises anybody who assumed the desert was too dry for a moisture problem. It is not the humidity that does it, it is the temperature swing.
The fixes are cheap and they work. Ventilation first: standard vents help, whirlybirds help more, and cross-flow is better than a single opening. Then get the gear up off the floor on pallets so anything that does drip has somewhere to go. Do not store anything damp inside a sealed container and expect it to dry out on its own. And set it up off the ground on pads so air moves under the floor, which also keeps the underside out of the dust. If you are storing paper, textiles, artwork or anything with electronics in it, mention that when you order and we will spec the ventilation properly rather than leaving you to retrofit it.
Worth knowing
Deliveries beyond the Alice
A lot of Central Australian containers go a long way past the town. Stations and communities out along the Tanami, the Plenty, the Mereenie Loop and the Sandover, and the run south toward Yulara or north to Ti Tree and beyond. Two things decide whether those deliveries work. The first is the road. Unsealed sections corrugate, wash out and close entirely after rain, and a road that a station ute uses without thinking about it is not necessarily a road for a loaded truck. Local road reports and a bit of patience are part of the job. The second is what is at the far end, because a remote site with no loader means we have to bring the lifting capability with us and that changes the truck.
Access to Aboriginal land generally requires a permit, and that is arranged through the relevant land council or the community rather than by us. It is routine, but it takes lead time and it cannot be organised on the morning of a delivery, so raise it with us at the quote stage and we will work the timing around it. The same goes for community store hours, cultural obligations and the local contact who will actually be there when the truck arrives. Deliveries out here go smoothly when all of that is settled a fortnight in advance and badly when it is not.
What delivery to Alice Springs costs
The cartage component depends on which depot the unit comes out of and what the site needs. We work it out with the quote.
Send three photos of the site with your enquiry and we can usually tell you the truck and the timing straight back.
Elsewhere in the district
We also deliver to Yulara, Tennant Creek, Hermannsburg, Ti Tree, Kings Canyon and the surrounding district. If your town is not on the list, ring — it almost certainly still works.
Common questions
Buying a container in Alice Springs
How long does delivery to Alice Springs take?
Two to four weeks from order to on the ground is the normal window. The Stuart Highway is sealed the whole way from both Darwin and Adelaide and it is a busy corridor, so the timing is really about when a truck is running with room on the deck rather than about the distance itself. Units needing modification first, a personnel door, extra vents or paint, add a few days. If you have a fixed date, a lease start, a tour season, a site handover, tell us at the enquiry and give us as much notice as the job allows.
Can you deliver out to a station or a remote community from Alice Springs?
Yes, out along the Tanami, the Plenty, the Mereenie Loop, the Sandover and south toward Yulara. Three things we need. The state of the road, honestly, because unsealed sections corrugate and close after rain and a station road is not automatically a truck road. Whether there is a loader or telehandler at the far end, because if there is not we bring the lifting gear and that changes the truck. And permits, since access to Aboriginal land is arranged through the land council or community and takes lead time. Raise all three at the quote stage.
Do containers get condensation in the desert?
Yes, more than people expect, and the reason is the temperature swing rather than humidity. A hot afternoon followed by a cold night makes moisture inside condense on the roof and drip back onto whatever is below it. Ventilation is the answer: vents at minimum, whirlybirds if the contents matter, and openings at both ends so air actually crosses through. Store gear on pallets rather than flat on the floor, and never shut damp equipment inside and expect it to dry. Tell us what is going in and we will spec the ventilation before it leaves rather than after.
Can I inspect the container before it comes to Alice Springs?
Stock for Central Australia comes off our Darwin depot or off an eastern states run, and inspection at a depot is by arrangement rather than a walk-in, so ring 1300 467 776 first if you want to organise it. For most Alice Springs buyers that is not practical, so ask for photos of the actual unit on request and we will send them before delivery: the corner castings, both ends, the roof and a shot down the length of the floor. If anything in those photos is not what you were expecting, we deal with it before the container gets on a truck.
Get a price
Get a price for your address
We deliver to Alice Springs and the surrounding district. Tell us what is going in it and what the access is like, and you will get a price with the cartage worked out. Every enquiry answered within one business day.
Or skip the form and ring us — 1300 467 776, Mon-Fri 7:30am-5pm, Sat 8am-12pm