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.
Sydney, NSW
Shipping containers Sydney
Sydney has no shortage of containers. Port Botany moves more boxes than anywhere in the country and the depots behind it hold real depth in every common size, so choice is rarely what holds a job up. The city is what holds it up. Sydney was built on sandstone around a harbour, and the result is narrow streets, split-level blocks, strata buildings, benched driveways and back yards you cannot see from the road. Almost every hard job here reduces to two questions: where can the truck legally stand, and how does the container get from there to the spot.
- Delivered from
- container depots behind Port Botany, with stock also drawn from the yards through Chullora, Yennora and the Erskine Park corridor
- Typical lead time
- Usually 3–5 business days from order to on the ground
- Usual truck
- Tilt-tray where there is a straight run in off the street; crane truck for terraces, strata sites and anything without side access
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.
Here is the honest version of buying a container here.
What they get used for around here
Around Sydney we deliver containers for site stores on the relentless knockdown-rebuild run through the Shire, Ryde and the Hills, tool and materials lock-ups for the trades working out of Smithfield, Wetherill Park, Ingleburn and Seven Hills, strata storage where a basement ran out of room a decade ago, film, event and festival gear that lives in a box between shoots, boat, board and dive gear on the northern beaches where the garage lost that argument long ago, stock overflow for small businesses squeezed by inner-west warehouse rents, and feed, fencing and machinery storage on the acreage through Kenthurst, Dural, Bringelly and the Hawkesbury flats.
What the driver needs from the site
The single most useful thing you can tell us about a Sydney delivery is what the frontage looks like, because the container is almost never the constraint. In the inner west and inner east — Newtown, Erskineville, Annandale, Balmain, Paddington, Surry Hills — the housing is terraces with no side access whatsoever, a rear lane if you are lucky, and streets where a truck standing still blocks the whole carriageway. Many of those streets are clearways or peak-hour restricted, which pins the delivery to a mid-morning or mid-afternoon window rather than whenever suits. Standing a crane on a public road generally means notice to the council and sometimes a permit, and that timeframe is theirs rather than ours, so start early. On the north shore and the northern beaches the problem changes shape. Avalon, Newport, Bilgola, Killara and the streets running off the ridgelines are benched into sandstone, which gives you a driveway with a severe crest at the kerb, a hard turn halfway down, and a garage under the house. Sandstone is superb bearing ground and awful to manoeuvre on. Add mature canopy that councils across the north are protective of, and the honest answer on some of those blocks is a smaller unit than you first wanted. Out west the ground changes again. Through Blacktown, Kellyville, Penrith and Camden you are on shale-derived reactive clay that swells through a wet winter and shrinks back hard in February, and it does not move evenly across a block. Down near the port and out to Kurnell and Cronulla it is sand, which drains beautifully and carries very little. The newer estates at Marsden Park, Oran Park, Box Hill and Leppington bring the familiar pattern of narrow carriageways, cars parked both sides, stormwater grates and comms pits on the kerb line that a loaded rear axle will crack, and cut-and-fill blocks that have not finished settling. On the Hawkesbury flats around Windsor, Pitt Town and Richmond the alluvial soil is excellent and the water is the thing to plan for. Photos from the street, along the approach and of the spot answer nearly all of it.
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 Sydney
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.
Sydney
Terraces, strata and lifting over the roof
A very large share of Sydney housing has no side access at all, and that is normal rather than a problem. The container goes over the top. A crane truck sets up on the street, lifts the unit over the terrace or the townhouse and places it in the courtyard or the back yard. The three things that decide feasibility are reach, clearance and the road. Reach, because a crane's lifting capacity falls away steeply as the boom extends, so twenty-two metres over a two-storey house is a much larger machine than eight metres over a rear fence. Clearance, because power and comms lines across the frontage, a pergola, a mature plane tree or a pool cage all have to be gone over rather than through. And the road, because outriggers need a footprint wider than the truck on firm level ground, which on a one-way inner-west street means occupying the whole carriageway for a period.
Strata and unit blocks add an administrative layer that is easy to underestimate. Buildings typically want written approval, a nominated delivery window, proof of insurance from whoever is carting it, and a route that avoids a basement with a clearance no truck is ever going to meet. None of that is hard. All of it is close to impossible to arrange on the morning of delivery. Get the approval and the window in hand first, then let us book the truck to land inside it. If your building has a loading dock and a booking system, tell us at the quote and we will work to it. Townhouse complexes and ground-floor apartments with a shared driveway want the same treatment, because the truck has to stand somewhere that does not block every other resident for the morning.
On the ground
Sandstone, shale and Botany sand
Sydney gives you three quite different grounds inside an hour's drive, and each one wants the same fix for a different reason. Sandstone through the harbour suburbs and along the northern ridgelines is as good a bearing surface as you will find, but it is almost never level and it will not let you dig a pad in without effort, so the answer is to build the low side up rather than cut the high side out. Digging the high side out only leaves a trench for water to run down and sit in against the steel. Reactive shale clay across the west and south-west takes up water through winter and shrinks back through summer, unevenly, and a container placed straight onto it will follow that movement one corner at a time and never come back. Coastal and Botany-side sand drains fast and carries badly, so a corner casting concentrating a couple of tonne will simply push down into it.
In all three cases the remedy is four hardwood sleepers or concrete pads under the corner castings, bedded level and checked on both diagonals, with the door end sitting on the high side of any fall. Get the floor a hundred millimetres or so clear of the ground so air moves underneath and the underside is not sitting against damp soil for a decade. It also makes the container far easier to lift out again later, which matters more than people expect on a Sydney block that will probably be redeveloped inside twenty years. Whichever of the three grounds you are on, mention it at the quote and we will bring the packing on the truck rather than leaving you a job for the weekend.
Worth knowing
Booking around a Sydney working day
Distance is not what makes a Sydney delivery slow. Windows are. A truck coming out of a Port Botany depot to Castle Hill, Penrith or Helensburgh is committed to a run that has to clear the clearways at each end, dodge the tunnels and the toll network sensibly, and still have time to set up and unload in daylight. That is why we schedule the metro work in blocks and why a firm morning slot on a tight street is worth asking for rather than assuming. Three to five business days from order to on the ground is what to plan for, and a crane booking, a strata window or a council permit will push the far end of it out.
The most useful thing you can do is give us the constraints at the enquiry rather than at the door. Whether the street is a clearway and when. Whether the building has a nominated delivery time. Whether the neighbours can be asked to move two cars off the frontage for an hour, which on a narrow inner-west street is frequently the entire difference between the job going in and the truck going home. Whether there is a gate, and what it measures at the narrowest point rather than at the posts. Tell us those four things and a Sydney delivery becomes ordinary. The more of it we know before the truck is loaded, the less of it turns into a problem on the day.
What delivery to Sydney costs
There is no flat delivery rate here worth publishing. What the truck has to do at your end changes it too much, so we quote it per job.
We would rather ask two more questions on the phone than send the wrong container up the road.
Other towns on the same run
We also deliver to Parramatta, Penrith, Liverpool, Campbelltown, Central Coast and the surrounding district. If your town is not on the list, ring — it almost certainly still works.
Common questions
Buying a container in Sydney
There is no side access to my terrace. Can you still get a container into the back yard?
Usually yes, by lifting it over. A crane truck stands on the street and places the container in the courtyard or the yard, which is routine across the inner west and inner east where side access simply does not exist. What decides it is how far the container has to travel horizontally, what it has to clear on the way, whether power or comms lines cross the frontage, and whether the street leaves room to plant the outriggers. Shots from the front gate, from the back yard looking toward the street, and one straight up at the lines will usually get you a straight answer on the phone.
Do I need council or strata approval for a container in Sydney?
For a unit block or a strata property, almost certainly, and it is worth starting early, because getting the approval and getting a delivery slot are two different queues. For a house, it comes down to length of stay, visibility from the road and what the container is used for, and the answer differs council to council. If a crane has to stand on a public road, councils generally want notice and may require a permit, and that timeframe is theirs. We will not guess at the rule for your address — check it before you order, then tell us the window you have been given and we will work inside it.
Can I inspect a container at the Port Botany depot before delivery?
Not generally, and it is fairer to say so plainly. The depots that hold Sydney stock are third-party facilities running heavy machinery all day and they are not set up for the public to walk through. What we do instead is send photos of the specific unit on request before delivery — corners, door end, roof and the internal floor — so you know exactly what is coming rather than a stock image of something similar. If you want more, ask for a particular angle and we will get it.
How far out of Sydney will you deliver?
Right across the basin and well beyond it — the Hawkesbury, the Blue Mountains, the Southern Highlands, the Illawarra and up the Central Coast are all normal work. What changes with distance is scheduling rather than capability, because runs past the metro get planned around the route rather than slotted into a day. The mountains and the Illawarra escarpment also bring steep, narrow approaches where the size question is worth settling first. Send the address and a photo taken from the road looking at your entrance and we will tell you what can physically get there.
Get a price
Get the container and the cartage in one number
We deliver to Sydney 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