How does your garage look like today? Do you need everything you’ve stowed away in there?
Or are you a hoarder who never throws things out in the name of ‘I might need it later’ or ‘They are of sentimental value’? Let’s face it, will you ever need to use that broken kids’ bicycle now that your kids are in college? Are all those magazines worth collecting dust and grime?
Most importantly, can you make your garage look neater and more spacious without having to throw anything out? It might seem like the toughest decision you might have to make cleaning up the garage, but you really need it.
It’s normal to think that things and your life will fall apart or not be the same again, and it’s normal to feel anxious about what will happen and the what-ifs, but the truth is that decluttering your home and your garage might be exactly what you need for a happier, simpler life.
And with all the uncertainty and anxiety around COVID-19, you need to do something to have some level of control and keep the anxiety under control, and decluttering the garage might be exactly what you need. If you have kids or live with your partner, this activity that would take you a few days would be exactly what you need for a break, to learn more about each other, and to bond.
Brenna Renn, Ph.D., a licensed clinical psychologist, notes that uncluttered spaces and decluttering is believed to help with anxiety because humans are hardwired to look out for different patterns in their environment, and we find comfort in the predictability of patterns and occurrences.
What this means is that by cleaning up and decluttering our spaces, it means that you create more predictable patterns, which lead to an enhancement of your mental health.
Clutter is believed to be more of visual static, and static is distracting. Decluttering spaces may help you relax more, and it might also lead to less anxiety and stress.
There’s also the fact that the resultant physical activity from decluttering allows your mind to wander is a healthy fashion. On top of these health benefits, there’s also the fact that decluttering helps in reducing family/ relationship.
Lastly, when you declutter, you have a chance of finding lost treasure. Of course, you don’t have to rush it, and it may take you months, but the truth is that you need to get your garage in order.
If you are unsure about where to start, we’ll help you by directing you to one of the best garage storage solutions, the Gladiator Garage Cabinet.
The Gladiator Garage cabinet is one of the best garage cabinets on the market, and it offers what you need to clean up and organize the garage space, whether it’s extremely cluttered or if you need additional space to organize the garage.
Table of Contents
Why Garage Cabinets?
While you don’t need the garage cabinets because you could make your COVID-19 project putting up of new open shelving – open shelving is, after all, easy to install/ configure, it’s strong, cheaper, and you can see where everything goes; the garage cabinets give off a more finished look.
And since you can close the cabinets, they make garage storage safer for dangerous items like gardening tools and chemicals. If you have kids, you know that they now have all the time in their hands to make big and dangerous messes, which is why we recommend the garage cabinets.
If you find the garage cabinets too expensive for you, you could opt for one or two cabinets then opt for open shelving for the top shelves holding less risky items.
Gladiator Garage Cabinet Review
There are many garage cabinet models on the market, but the Gladiator Garage cabinet is the best option for us because it offers everything you need.
What we mean is that if you are looking for the best metal garage cabinet that will lend a cohesive look to your garage, specifically from one manufacturer, and if you are looking at the quality of the pieces above all else, then the Gladiator cabinet might be exactly what you need.
This cabinet also features a solid-fit allowing you to store all your stuff easily. What makes the Gladiator cabinets that cool (or not so cool)?
Designs
The Gladiator cabinets make a good fit for anyone looking for sturdily-build, durable, and simply, the best quality cabinets for garages. These cabinets are surprisingly affordable, which means that a Gladiator cabinet would be an excellent option for you to add some safe storage to your garage.
What stands out the most from these cabinets has to be the fact that there are two options – the Premier cabinets and the RTA (Ready-to-Assemble) Gladiator cabinets.
Premier Gladiator Cabinet
These are free-standing cabinets that are professionally designed and welded in the Gladiator factory. They fit together very well, and you shouldn’t expect any gaps between them and along the side panels.
And with the tight welding, it means that the Premier Gladiator cabinets are more waterproof/ water-resistant, and you should minimal leaking. This welding perfection means that the Premier cabinet would be a great fit if you need the cabinet set on the floor.
The Premier cabinets are, however, noticeably smaller than the RTA cabinets, with the Premier cabinets being 65” tall by 30” wide. Both cabinets are 18” deep.
The only issue with the Premier cabinet is that you might find a small gap along the sides, where the panels meet at the bottom or the top of the panels. You shouldn’t use this cabinet outdoors.
RTA Gladiator Cabinet
This cabinet needs assembly once it’s shipped, and as mentioned above, it is bigger than the Premier cabinet – 72”x36”x18”.
The RTA design of these cabinets is, however, not perfect, and since the parts are not put together by the technicians in the factory, this cabinet will leave gaps when you put the parts together.
If you are going to fix 2 or more RTA cabinets together, you should know that the cabinets will leave a gap between each other. To assemble the cabinet, you’ll use the two matte-black screws provided.
You have to screw them to each corner (2 screws on each corner), and each side will be connected by 8 metal screws. These screws are the ones that hold things together. Unfortunately, there is nothing else there to hold the panels, and that and there is a small gap along the sides of the panels.
The gap left from the assembly is big enough for water to leak into the cabinet. These RTA cabinets should, therefore, be used indoors, and you need to be extra careful cleaning them.
The screws give the cabinet that sturdy, impervious, industrial, and heavy-duty look that leaves you with a clean and simple finish. Now that we have these differences out of the way and you know the features of the RTA and the Premier cabinets, let’s look at the other features of these cabinets.
Is the assembly of this Gladiator cabinet easy? Well, let’s just say that if you can assemble anything from IKEA, you’d be able to assemble this RTA Gladiator cabinet.
Depending on the size of the cabinet, the assembly should take anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour. Be ready to assemble and re-do the process a number of times, especially if this is the first time you are working with these cabinets.
To avoid gaps, even though there is always the potential of leaving gaps because you have to attach each panel independently of the others, you need to be extra careful with the assembly of the cabinets. Also, be careful when assembling the cabinet’s parts and the panels because panels bend easily under pressure.
Construction Material
Gladiator garage cabinets are some of the good garage cabinet brands on the market, but they are not the best. These cabinets are made of thin-gauge steel. It’s a tough metal for cabinets, but it’s not the best, and it bends under pressure or if it’s mishandled.
This will be an issue if you are buying the RTA cabinet. This won’t be an issue if you opt for the smaller and factory-assembled Premier cabinets.
The bends notwithstanding, the Gladiator garage cabinets have a dark-grey-hammered finish, which will hide all the small imperfections, giving your garage that perfect and uniform finish you have been looking for in your garage.
Steel Gauge
The metal gauge determines the strength and durability of the cabinets, and as expected, these two types of Gladiator garage cabinets are not made of the same gauge steel.
The Premier line boasts the use of higher and thicker-grade steel compared to the Ready-To-Assemble cabinet. The Premier cabinets are made of 20-gauge steel while the RTA cabinets are made of 22-gauge steel, explaining the bigger weight capacity of the Premier cabinets.
Shelf Storage
While both designs of Gladiator cabinets come with the risk of leakages, they work well for garages, as long as they are cleaned carefully and occasionally.
Both cabinets come with movable shelves designed to attach to the interior of the cabinets by use of tabs/ wall brackets present on each side. The wall brackets enhance the flexibility of the shelf storage, and you can slide the shelves up or down easily, as long as there is a slot for the tab.
The shelves in the Premier and the RTA cabinets differ though. The Premier cabinet features 6 connection tabs, with 2 tabs on either side of the cabinet and two more tabs on the backside, hence the higher weight capacity.
On the other hand, the RTA Gladiator cabinet features 4 tabs, 2 on each side connecting to the side panels, and none at the back. These differences in the number of shelving tabs is the reason for the variation in weight capacities.
Even though the RTA cabinet is bigger than the Premier cabinet, the RTA cabinet has a lower 40lbs weight capacity, against the Premier cabinet’s weight capacity of 50lbs – per shelf.
Feet and Casters
The Gladiator garage cabinets will come with either leveling feet or wheeled casters, and depending on your needs, you could also buy an additional caster kit separately. Of the two, the leveling feet are rather basic, and they feature a hard plastic base at the bottom of one screw.
This screw is, however, long enough to allow you to easily adjust the cabinet’s stability, especially if the garage floor is not level. The Premier cabinets often come with the casters, which are pretty sturdy and big enough to support the weight of the cabinets and what’s stored inside.
We recommend the casters (often 5”) because they are made of heavy-duty rubberized plastic, and it attaches to the cabinet’s base with 4 sturdy bolts. The caster wheels at the front are swiveling wheels, but the two at the rear are fixed, as is the standard design for all rolling cabinets on the market.
Thanks to the portable design of the caster wheels, you cleaning the cabinets, and the garage will be easier and safer, and if you move houses in the future, transportation of the storage boxes will have been simplified for you.
On the other hand, if the rolling action of the wheels doesn’t sit well with you, either because of kids or preference, then you might want to mount the cabinets on the wall. Mounting is not only safer, but it also means that you will have enough space beneath the cabinet near the eye level.
Locks
The other feature of the Gladiator cabinets is that they come with locks. Each double-door premier cabinet drawn from Gladiator’s Premier cabinets features a circular key lock along with 2 keys – all except the 24” Premier cabinet, which doesn’t have a lock.
The RTA cabinets also have locks, save for the smaller, cheaper ones. The locks used ar the round-key door locks, and there’s also the pin-and-clasp latch.
Peg hooks
For added storage, you might like the built-in slots which allow for easy addition of ring hooks or peg hooks.
Door Magnets
This might not be a huge thing, but Gladiator cabinets also come with bigger door magnets, which make a huge difference in keeping the cabinet doors closed without any vibrations or wiggling.
The door magnets in the Premier line run throughout the length of the door from top to bottom, with this entire length having a single connection point that keeps the door closed at all times.
The RTA cabinets, on the other hand, only have a smaller magnet fixed in the middle of one shelf. This magnet is not as solid as what you find in the Premier cabinets, but it keeps the door closed.
Wire Grommet
This is a feature seen in the 28” RTA Gladiator cabinets only, and it’s an excellent feature if you want to use the lower shelf for a Bluetooth speaker.
Warranty
You will be happy to know that all Premier Gladiator cabinets come with a lifetime warranty while the RTA cabinets come with a 10-year warranty.
So, if you are thinking of making a good lifetime investment, it would be a great idea to choose the Premier line because it offers more, including the extra peace of mind you know you need.
How to Mount Your Gladiator Cabinet on the Wall
You will be happy to know that you can install your Gladiator cabinets on the wall easily, attaining that clean look, while also making it easier for you to clean the garage.
Keeping the cabinets on the floor might sound like a great idea, especially if you are like the caster wheels design, but since the cabinets don’t have their panels fitted with absolutely no gaps, it would be riskier leaving them on the floor.
Gladiator has made the installation of these cabinets quite easy because they are designed to be installed/ mounted on the Gearwall/GearTrack system by Gladiator.
The 30” and the 28” wall cabinets come with a mounting bracket at the back that slides into the wall channels seamlessly. The taller boxes will come with 3 brackets for support, and the smaller cabinets only two brackets.
To mount the cabinets, first, secure the topmost bracket tightly in place, but don’t tighten the other screws because it should slide in the track channel. You need help to line up the brackets and to install the cabinet, which might be heavy.
Keeping the lower brackets loose allows for a more safe space to work with because the cabinet might not fit perfectly in place the first time. Tighten the screws when it’s all set.
But bear in mind that it might not fit perfectly with the first few adjustments, and you need to keep adjusting the lower brackets until you find the perfect fit.
Gladiator Premier and RTA Cabinets
Pros
Cons
Choosing the best Garage Cabinets
You have four options for the best garage cabinets, and your choice of one over the other would depend on several concerns, including your budget and your garage storage needs. These options include:
Metal Cabinets
If you are planning to go all in to build a dream garage, the idea of a garage organized using heavy-duty steel or even stainless steel cabinets might be exactly what you have in mind, which is why the Gladiator Garage cabinets come in handy.
There are lightweight and heavy options on the market, but the best top-of-the-line metal cabinets would be made of the most durable, high-end-looking cabinets. These cabinets are pricey, but they are a good lifetime investment.
But if you cannot afford the higher-end cabinets, you’d still find good-quality metal cabinets made of lightweight and lighter-gauge metals like aluminum or powder-coated varieties.
These cabinets can be either ready-to-assemble or the fully-assembled versions, and they come in different colors.
Recycled Kitchen Cabinets
These cabinets are the most affordable, easy to fund locally, and you could buy the reused cabinets from local organizations or your kitchen if you are renovating the kitchen.
They might look ugly, but you only need a new coat of paint for a good face uplift.
Molded Plastic cabinets
These cabinets are the most affordable, new garage cabinets.
They are ideally designed for use in garages, and they come in various sizes from small and narrow for lawn rakes and other tools to the shed-size units.
The upside of these cabinets is that they are waterproof, easy to clean, and rust-proof. Their assembly is also easy, and they come in different styles, some are lockable, and others can be mounted on the floor.
Laminated-surface cabinets
These sturdy cabinets made of plywood and medium-density fiberboard (MDF) or even particleboard cores covered with similar laminate or durable melamine surfaces.
These cabinets come in all sizes, styles, and colors. They need some assembly, though, and these garage cabinets come in sizes best suited for garage use.
Conclusion – Should You Buy the Gladiator Garage Cabinets?
While the Gladiator cabinets are not the absolute best on the market, these cabinets are good enough, and they are built to last. As seen above, there is the factory-assembled Premier line and the Ready-to-Assemble line of garage cabinets.
If you are unsure about which of these two lines would best work for your garage, you first need to keep in mind that they are both good options; but one might be better for you.
Even if you prefer IKEA-like product assemblies, the Premier garage cabinet is a better choice for you because it has a higher weight capacity, comes with a lifetime warranty, it’s made of stronger steel, the door magnet runs throughout the length of the door, and it has more shelf brackets.
It might be pricier, but it offers a good deal. Overall, the Gladiator brand of garage cabinets is pretty good, and the cabinets from the brand would be a good investment.