How to store camping gear and festival essentials between trips

Camping season is here! Do you enjoy camping out just for the fun of it, or only stay in a tent because it’s the most authentic (or cheapest) way to enjoy your favourite festivals? Whatever your reason for sleeping under canvas, camping comes with a surprising amount of kit - and between adventures, you’ll need to store that kit somewhere so that it’s ready for next time. So, how and where do you store camping gear when you’re not using it?

What camping gear do you have?

To decide how and where to store it, first have a think about just how much stuff you have.

Festival camping gear

Veteran festival campers know that if you want to be able to find all your stuff on packing up day, you’d better take a few hanging storage bags. There’s very little room in a festival tent for the sort of flat-pack cupboards and furniture that holiday campers take for extra comfort, so having a few storage bags that you can hang from your poles to keep your clothes and toiletries organised and easy to find is essential.

You might also use plastic storage boxes to pop outside your door to keep cooking gear or outdoor shoes/coats dry, clean and creepy-crawly-free without taking up space inside your tent. A pop-up laundry basket is a good idea if you’ve got a bit of room, to keep your dirty laundry separate from your clean, and make it easier to sort your washing out when you get home.

Holiday camping gear

If you’re a holiday camper, you might like just having the basics and living wild, or your tent can be pretty much a home from home, depending on how ‘close to nature’ you want to be (or not). 

As well as your tent and sleeping bags, you might have folding furniture such as a table and chairs, wardrobe and drawers, and maybe a blow-up mattress and blow-up comfy chairs. There are plenty of other things you could take, especially if you have an electric hook-up, such as an electric blanket, fridge, toaster and kettle. Then there’s the cutlery, crockery, gas stove, pans … the list goes on!

So that’s a lot of stuff. What do you do with all your camping gear between festivals or camping trips?

Step 1: Clean and dry your camping gear

Even if you’ve been blessed with sunshine (unlikely, yes, but not impossible), your tent will need to be properly aired and dried before you pack it away after your trip. The tent floor has been in contact with the ground, and will have become damp from dew if not rain. If you don’t dry it before you store it, it will rot and smell terrible. 

Likewise, your sleeping bags will need putting through the wash in much the same way as your bedsheets at home - you wouldn’t strip your bed and put your dirty sheets in your wardrobe without washing them, would you?

Wash what you can, wipe down the rest, make sure it’s all totally dry to prevent mildew and mould. Then:

Step 2: Organise and pack

When it comes to packing, organisation is key. Use clear plastic bins or heavy-duty storage containers to separate and protect your gear; anything made from material (e.g. your sleeping bags) can be put into vacuum storage bags to minimise the amount of space they take up.

Label everything with a permanent marker so that it’s easy to find everything at a glance.

Try to store things together in a way that makes sense, so that when you come to pitch up you’ll be able to find what you need in a logical order. So, don’t store your pegs and poles in a different container to your tent, and don’t mix ‘inside’ gear with ‘outside’ gear. That way, you can open and unpack one box/bag at a time without having to put things like sleeping mats/blow up beds on the floor outside before your tent is erected.

So, group together:

• Camping gear for outside: Tents, tarps, poles, pegs.
• Camping gear for inside: sleeping mats, blankets, pillows, mattress, sleeping bags.
• Electrical gear: Torches, lanterns, electric hook up wires, fridge, power banks, fairy lights - make sure any batteries are removed and stored separately so they don’t leak and ruin your stuff.
• Festival essentials: costumes, glow sticks, snack bars and other accessories.

Step 3: Find somewhere to store it

If you have a shed that’s watertight, loft space or understairs cupboard space, these can be good places to keep your camping gear. Bear in mind, though, that pests can get into any of these places, and thefts from sheds are not uncommon, sadly.

Whatever you do, if you store your camping gear at home, make sure you remember how many boxes/bags you have and double check on every trip that you have remembered to load all of them into the car. Getting to the campsite or festival after a long journey and discovering that you’ve forgotten your tent poles is pretty soul destroying!

If you’d rather keep everything together in one place, where it won’t be damaged by damp or pests, and where it won’t get in your way, you could look into using self storage for your camping gear.

Our self storage units are indoor lockers or rooms that only you would have access to; they’re not exposed to the elements, and our stores are all covered by CCTV, alarms, fire and pest prevention. You can rent a locker or a room for a couple of weeks at a time, for as long as you like. 

Camping gear is commonly stored with us, because it’s usually only needed for a few weeks or months each year, and is pretty bulky and awkward to store at home. Other things like Christmas decorations and sports equipment are often stored with us for the same reasons.

The only thing you couldn’t store with us would be gas canisters (or anything flammable), as these are not permitted for the safety of all our customers and their belongings. Everything else can be stored with us and will be clean, safe and dry until your next adventure.

Can we help?

We have self storage units in stores all over the country, so there’s bound to be one near you. You are welcome to access your belongings as often as you like during our normal opening hours.  Some of our stores do offer extended hours but this is something you would need to arrange when booking.  So, you’ll be able to pick up your camping gear and head off whenever you like (or whenever the sun shines!).

If you’d like information about our unit sizes, to help you work out how much space you’ll need, we have some useful walkthrough guides and a size calculator here. If you’d rather get some tailored advice, please message or give us a call and one of our team can help you choose the best size for what you plan to store. They can also help with pricing information and location advice, with no obligation or pressure to book.

If you decide to reserve a unit with us, there’s no deposit to pay and you can reserve online or by phone.

Happy camping!