Frequently Asked Questions

Containers arrive on a tilt-bed truck, which slides the container off the back. That means the truck needs a straight, level run at the drop point:

• 20ft container: about 70 feet of straight clearance from the drop point
• 40ft container: about 100 feet of straight clearance from the drop point

It also needs roughly 10 to 12 ft of width and clear air above. Low utility lines, tree limbs and roof overhangs stop a delivery more often than anything on the ground does. If you are unsure, describe the approach when you ask for a quote and we will tell you before anything is scheduled.

Watch a delivery: container delivery video.

Price moves with three things: the size, the grade, and how far your address sits from the depot holding the unit. That last one is why we do not publish a single statewide number. The starting prices on this site name the grade and the city they were captured in, so you can see the floor rather than a marketing figure. For your address, the quote form or a phone call gets you a real number, delivery included.

Warranty runs by grade: one-trip units carry a 10 year structural and no-leak warranty, cargo worthy and wind and water tight units carry 5 years, and economy units carry a 1 year no-roof-leak warranty. The warranty travels with the grade you buy, so if warranty length matters to you it is worth comparing grades before you compare prices.

Yes. We sell containers outright, and we work with financing partners who offer rent-to-own, which spreads the payments and leaves you owning the container at the end. We do not do short-term rentals. If you want the full comparison, our rent vs buy guide walks through when each path makes sense.

Missouri pricing starts at $2,332 for a 20ft Wind and Water Tight container delivered in St. Louis, captured from Container One on 6 August 2026. The same 20ft Wind and Water Tight unit is $2,438 delivered in Kansas City and $2,681 delivered in Springfield. Price moves with size, grade, what is in stock and how far the truck runs, so the number that matters is the one quoted to your ZIP code. Delivery is included in every figure above.

It changes the haul, which is the part of a delivered price that moves. Kansas City and St. Louis each have a Container One yard, about sixteen miles and under six miles from their downtowns, so neither metro is subsidising the other. St. Louis is the state anchor because it has the shortest run and the lowest price on the advertised grade in the 20ft size, $2,332 delivered against $2,438 in Kansas City. Kansas City is genuinely lower on three of the twelve size and grade lines, including a 40ft standard height Wind and Water Tight at $2,703 delivered against $2,730 in St. Louis. Give us your ZIP, the size and the grade and we will quote the real number.

There is no Missouri rule to look up, and that is the single most useful thing to know before you start. Missouri has no statewide building code for general construction and no state agency authorised to adopt one, and zoning is local as well, so the answer genuinely changes at a city line. Kansas City names portable storage containers directly in its adopted code and puts a clock, an area limit and a height limit on residential placements. Springfield does not name containers at all but requires a building permit for an accessory structure over 100 square feet, which both container sizes exceed. St. Louis is a question for the counter, and we say so rather than guessing. One call to the office that would actually issue your permit, with your parcel address in hand, settles it.

Often not, and in Missouri that question matters more than in most states. Kansas City's limits sit in four counties at once, the City of St. Louis belongs to no county at all, and St. Louis County holds more than ninety separate municipalities. Around Springfield, Nixa and Ozark are in Christian County rather than Greene. A mailing address is not a jurisdiction. Your property tax bill names the government that actually has your parcel, and that is the office to call about a container.

Level and firm at the four corners, because that is where the entire load goes. Gravel, compacted rock, concrete or asphalt all work, with blocks or timbers under the four corner castings so the box sits level, the doors keep swinging true and the floor stays out of standing water. Missouri adds three local wrinkles. River bottom gumbo holds water into early summer and ruts under a loaded truck. New subdivision fill in the Northland or St. Charles County will not carry weight until it has settled. And in the Ozarks the rock underneath is usually good news for bearing, but karst means a sinkhole, spring or soft low corner is worth pointing out before we set rather than after.

Typically one to two weeks anywhere in the state, and the reason is the two depots. Kansas City and St. Louis each have their own yard, and between them every Missouri address is a single day's run for a truck. Springfield draws from Kansas City at 151 road miles and sits in the same window. The far northern corners around Kirksville and Unionville, the southern tier around Thayer and Gainesville, and the deep Bootheel around Caruthersville get scheduled with a little more notice rather than a longer promise. What moves a date more often than distance is access: the straight run for a tilt bed, the overhead clearance and the ground.

Four grades, four different warranties, and the difference is worth understanding before you choose on price. A 1-Trip container has made a single loaded voyage, looks close to new, and carries a 10 year structural and no-leak warranty. Cargo Worthy has been surveyed as fit for ocean shipment and carries a 5 year warranty. Wind and Water Tight is the practical storage grade and carries a 5 year warranty; it is the grade our advertised Missouri price is quoted on. Economy is the budget grade with a 1 year warranty covering roof leaks only. Refrigerated units are sold inspected and tested, with any service history we hold, and carry no separate refrigeration warranty.

Rust from the outside is not the usual Missouri problem. These boxes are built from weathering steel that forms a stable surface layer, and they spend their working lives crossing oceans in salt spray. The Missouri problem is on the inside. Summer here delivers high dew points for months, and on a clear night the roof panel radiates heat to the sky and can fall below the temperature of the air touching it, which is when moisture condenses on the ceiling. The fixes are unglamorous and they work: set the box level and off the ground, ventilate it, and if you insulate, make the insulation touch the steel everywhere so there is no air gap behind it to condense on.

Yes, and rural Missouri is a large share of what we do. Fields, hay ground, equipment yards, gins and hunting property usually have room to work, and most placements are a straight pull off a county road or a lettered route. The questions we ask are about the last half mile rather than the parcel. Is it gravel, chip and seal, blacktop or a field road. Is there a slab crossing or a one-lane bridge with a posted limit between the road and the drop spot. Is any of it bottom ground that stays soft into June. A hard freeze in January is honestly the best delivery surface north Missouri and the Bootheel offer all year, and it is worth planning a bottom ground placement around one on purpose.

Yes. Rent-to-own is available and it is the same container, the same grade and the same warranty as a purchase, with the monthly payment building toward ownership instead of ending when you hand the box back. Straight rental is also available when the need is genuinely short. The way to choose is arithmetic: ask for the delivered purchase price, the monthly rental and the rent-to-own terms for the same box at the same address on one call, and the months you actually need it will point at the answer.

• One-trip: made one loaded ocean crossing. Clean floors, intact paint, close to new.
• Cargo worthy: certified fit to carry cargo at sea. Structurally sound, cosmetically used.
• Wind and water tight (WWT): inspected to confirm the doors seal, there are no holes, and the interior stays dry. Surface rust, paint wear and minor dents are normal.
• Economy: the lowest grade we sell. Weathered, and priced accordingly.

For a grade-by-grade walkthrough with photographs, see the container condition guide.

It depends on what the container is for. If it is going to be seen, lived in, or converted, the clean interior and intact paint save real work later and the 10 year structural and no-leak warranty is the longest we carry. If it is going behind a shed to hold equipment, a wind and water tight unit does the same job for less.

We offer 20ft standard, 40ft standard and 40ft high cube containers, plus modified containers and refrigerated units in 20ft and 40ft.

Personnel doors, roll-up doors, windows, vents, skylights, electrical wiring and a panel, LED lighting, insulation, spray foam, HVAC, shelving, workbenches and exterior paint. Which of those matter depends on the climate the box will sit in: Missouri is genuinely mixed rather than cooling led or heating led, and that is the harder design case. Under the 2021 International Energy Conservation Code the state spans three climate zones: 3A in Dunklin and Pemiscot counties at the very bottom of the Bootheel, 4A across most of the state including Kansas City, St. Louis, Springfield and Columbia, and 5A across twenty-six northern counties. What that means for a steel box is that moisture drives inward through a long humid summer and outward on cold winter nights, so an assembly optimised for one direction fails in the other. Missouri also has no mandatory statewide energy code for private construction, so those numbers are the model code benchmark rather than automatically your legal requirement. Ask your building department which edition they enforce, if any..

A reefer has a refrigeration unit built into one end. It runs on a 460V 3-phase supply, or a compatible generator where 3-phase power is not available, and holds anywhere from -25 degrees F to +70 degrees F. The walls are insulated as part of the original build, not retrofitted.

Start with the ground you actually have. In Missouri, Four corner castings carrying the entire load onto ground that changes character four times across the state. A house spreads its weight along a continuous footing; a container puts all of it through four points, which is why containers end up out of level with doors that no longer close. North of the Missouri River much of the state is claypan that drains slowly and stays soft for a stretch every spring. In both river bottoms it is gumbo, heavy clay that holds water into early summer and sets hard in August, and neither behaves well under four point loads at the wrong time of year. South of the river most of the Ozarks sits on soluble limestone and dolomite, which means karst: the Missouri Department of Natural Resources has identified roughly sixteen thousand sinkholes in the state and about seven thousand seven hundred documented caves. Thin soil over sound rock gives excellent bearing at shallow depth once you know what is under the pad, which is the reason to look before you set rather than a reason not to build there.

For temporary placement: Set the container on solid bearing at the four corner castings rather than straight onto turf. Pressure treated timbers, concrete blocks or a compacted rock pad under each corner keeps the box level, keeps the doors square and keeps the wood floor out of standing water. Grade so surface water runs away from the corners rather than under them. On new subdivision fill in the Northland or St. Charles County, a few sheets of plywood along the wheel path keeps a loaded truck from rutting the yard on a wet week.

For permanent placement or a conversion: Poured piers or footings under each corner casting, bearing on undisturbed soil and sized for the actual load rather than dropped on as a block. The IRC requires exterior footings at least twelve inches below undisturbed grade and below the local frost line where one applies, and in Missouri that frost figure is set by your jurisdiction rather than by the state. On karst ground, check the parcel against the Department of Natural Resources GeoSTRAT mapping for documented sinkhole points and areas before you spend anything on drawings. In the southeast quarter of the state the connection between the box and its foundation is designed under a stricter seismic design category than in the northwest corner, and that is work for a Missouri licensed engineer.

Frost depth: There is no single statewide figure, because Missouri has no statewide building code and no state row in IRC Table R301.2 to fall back on. The depth used in Rock Port is not the depth used in Kennett. Ask your building department for their number, and where there is no building department, have your engineer establish it. The IRC minimum of twelve inches below undisturbed grade is the floor, never the answer. Anything meant to be permanent needs its bearing points below that line, or the whole assembly moves with the first hard freeze.

Basements and full frost depth foundations are the Missouri norm for houses, which is a useful thing to know because it means most local building departments already have a frost figure and a soil expectation on file for your address. What governs a container is different: where the water goes, whether the ground under the four corners stays firm through a wet spring, and whether the pad has been benched into a hillside or dropped on fill that has not finished settling.

At a minimum, make the placement area level and firm, and clear debris, rocks and brush out of the way. Confirm the straight run above, and look up for lines and limbs. Soft ground is the single most common cause of a delayed delivery: a loaded flatbed will sink, so a driver will wait for the ground to dry rather than tear up your property. Send photos of the site with your quote request and we will tell you if anything needs doing first.

The box itself is 14-gauge Corten steel and is very hard to cut. The lock is the weak point, so use a hidden shackle lock, sometimes called a puck lock, inside a lockbox welded over the handle. Many of our units already have a lockbox fitted.

The recurring signs are a price far under the market, a seller who will not let the container be seen or photographed, payment demanded by wire transfer or crypto, no physical business address, and pressure to decide today. A real dealer will give you a phone number, answer questions before payment, and put the quote in writing.