Office cleanouts have gotten larger and more frequent along 128 and 495. A company renewing a lease on half the floor space it used to hold has to do something with the other half: workstations, task chairs, credenzas, a storage room of dead monitors, and a filing system nobody has opened since it was digitized.
These jobs go wrong in predictable ways, and none of them are about the container.
Furniture is bulky, not heavy
This is the one job we run where volume, not weight, is the binding constraint. Cubicle systems, panel walls, task chairs and laminate desking fill a box quickly and weigh very little. Fifteen workstations broken down will fill a 20-yard long before they come near its two-ton allowance.
So do not size an office job the way you would size a demolition. Count the footprint you are clearing, not the tonnage. Paying for weight you will never use is the most common way to overspend on an office cleanout.
Files are the opposite
Paper is dense. A records room will hit a standard weight allowance while the container still looks half empty — say "file purge" when you ask for the quote and the tonnage is priced into the agreement instead of surprising anyone at the scale.
Before any of it reaches a container, though, there is a legal step. Massachusetts requires records holding personal information to be destroyed so they cannot be read or reconstructed, which under M.G.L. c. 93I means shredded, burned or pulverized. A dumpster is none of those. Personnel files, client records, anything carrying a Social Security or account number goes to a shredding vendor, and the certificate of destruction is worth keeping. Your compliance team almost certainly has a vendor for this already. What reaches us should be the marketing collateral, the old catalogs and the binders nobody can name.
The electronics problem
Monitors, cathode ray tubes and televisions are banned from disposal in Massachusetts, so the pile of retired hardware in the storage closet needs an electronics recycler. Wiping a machine and recycling it are two different jobs, and neither one is a container. The same goes for the office fridge and any window air conditioner: refrigerant has to be recovered by a certified technician before the unit is scrapped.
Placement at a commercial building
A loading dock is ideal when there is one. Where there is not, a surface lot works, and the practical questions are all about which spaces you are allowed to give up: not accessible parking, not a fire lane, and not the run the building's own trash compactor is serviced from.
A parking structure is never an option. Our truck raises the box on a hoist before setting it down, so it needs open sky above the spot regardless of how tall the deck looks from inside.
Most landlords and property managers want a certificate of insurance naming the building owner before anything is placed on their lot. Email [email protected] with the certificate holder details and we will send it. Ask your property manager early: that document is the single most common reason an office move slips a week.
Running the job over several days
Floor-by-floor clearances rarely fit one delivery. Two options: keep the box longer, or swap it. Extra days past your rental period run $25 a day. A swap, where we take the full container and drop an empty one, is $100.
Which is right depends on what you actually ran out of. If you need more time, extend. If you need more space, swap. Tell us the shape of the job when you book and we will say which one costs you less, including when the answer is that you should have taken the next size up.
Need this on a schedule?
Request a commercial accountSizing an office cleanout
Count the footprint, not the tonnage. A single office or a conference room fits the 10 or 12 yard. A department is a 15. A floor of workstations is a 20, and frequently more than one load.
Custom commercial pricing and quotes
Commercial rates and included tonnage are set per agreement, not off a rate card — volume, schedule and what the loads actually weigh all move the number. Call 617-459-7536 and Steve will price the work itself, or send the outline and he calls you.
Call 617-459-7536 Request a quote online
Just need one container, once? A single roll-off still books online in about a minute at the published rate.
Questions we get on office moves
What size container fits an office cleanout?
Size it on volume rather than weight. A single office or a conference room suits the 10 or 12 yard. A floor of workstations is usually a 20-yard, and often more than one load, because cubicle systems are bulky and light.
Can we put files straight into the dumpster?
Only files with no personal information in them. Massachusetts law requires records containing personal information to be shredded, burned or pulverized, so those go to a shredding vendor rather than a container. Marketing material, old catalogs and general paper are fine.
Can the container go in our parking garage?
No. The truck raises the container on a hoist before setting it down, so it needs open sky above the placement spot. A surface lot or a loading dock area is the workable option at almost every commercial building.
Will you provide a certificate of insurance for our landlord?
Yes. Send the certificate holder name and address to [email protected] and we will have it issued. It is worth requesting this as soon as the move date is set, because landlord approval is the step that most often delays an office cleanout.