Bin liners are an amazing and versatile product to have on hand. I would even go so far as to call them a tool. I call them a tool because when I have something that needs a solution, I sometimes go to bin liners. Allow me to explain. I was cleaning out my garage the other day and I came across an old roll of bin liners. That’s right, I said roll. This is because bin liners conveniently come on a roll, just like garbage bags do. Only bin liners are quite a bit bigger, and they are gusseted.

At PackagingSupplies.com there are close to a hundred sizes. That’s not an exaggeration, either. At least there are fifty. If I counted them all I would probably wind up somewhere in the middle, like eighty, but that doesn’t seem like a productive way to be spending my time. Feel free to do so, and let me know the exact number if you want. But the point is that the smallest size is thirty-six inches by twenty-eight inches by sixty inches. That’s right, this is the smallest size. Three feet by five feet. That’s pretty big, with over two feet in width. Remember how I said that bin liners are gusseted? That means they have a width. Normal garbage bags are just two flat pieces of plastic bound at the sides, and open at one end. It is flat.

At the sides of the bin liners an extra piece of fabric is sown in so that the liner gets wider as it goes down to the bottom, so that entire bottom space of the bin can be used to maximum capacity. This is a handy trick indeed. Back to the sizes… The largest size is fifty-eight inches by forty-six inches by one hundred twenty-five inches. That’s over five and a half feet by ten feet! I mean, not to give anyone some crazy ideas, but you could fit some pretty huge stuff in there. Like probably even a tiger.

If I wanted to secretly ship a tiger somewhere I could imagine myself using the hugest bin liner, in the hugest bin. Cut some holes in there, toss in a few slabs of frozen meat, and that tiger should arrive at his destination with no problems (and without ruining the bin, thanks to the liner!). You may not find yourself wanting to ship a tiger, but you could probably find something else.

When going to buy bin liners it is crucial to know the size of the box. Perhaps that just seems obvious, but there is a reason to this ridiculous suggestion. Bin liners consist of a width and a depth and a length. When calculating what size liner you will need you need to know the width and depth of the box, and then add one inch to each for the liner.

Also, the length of the bag must consist of the height of the box, plus the depth of the box, plus six more inches to make sure that everything in the box will be covered effectively. As you can see, simply guessing at what size might work isn’t really a great way to go. I am not a math person, otherwise I might attempt to walk you through the process, but in the end I fear you would up with something grossly off the mark.

I have talked before about gussets and about how the bin liners from PackagingSupplies.com are gusseted (well, I’m sure all of them are, but I’m focused on one resource). I explained how gussets are extra pieces of material sewn in to expand the item, and this is why we now have pants and bin liners and stuff like that. Well, I didn’t get a chance to mention where gussets come from. It’s really quite fascinating, you see. It comes from an Old French word for “armpit” (did you have any doubt that it would be an old word?).

More specifically it describes a piece of armor used for the armpit. So it was originally a term used when referring to armor, and then apparently the idea caught on and they began using gussets in clothing around the mid fifteen-hundreds. I don’t know why they waited so long, but I’m glad they finally decided to incorporate them in the everyday person’s wardrobe. We can’t all wear armor just for the sake of the gussets.

I thought all of that was very interesting. It’s fascinating that what was once used to describe armor amongst French people, hundreds of years ago at that, is now a term that I am explaining to you in regards to bin liners. The even crazier thing: it’s still doing the same job!

Once again, just as a friendly reminder, when trying to figure out what size liner to purchase, make sure you know how big the box is. You don’t want everything to fit nicely and then you discover that when you try to tie the bag there is a huge ginormous gap which essentially defeats the purpose of protecting the product.