Free cooler source for shipping etc

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LanceR

Smoking Fanatic
Original poster
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★ Lifetime Premier ★
Jun 1, 2012
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Pinnacle, NC
Hello All

We make a lot of sausage, cure a lot of meats and process a number of deer each year.  When our six kids visit we often send them home with meats and other things from the freezers and keeping track of who has who's coolers is a PITA. 

Enter the heroine of the story, an acquaintance who is a veterinarian.  She receives her live vaccines by mail in boxed foam coolers along with reusable freezer packs.  Some of the coolers as simply one inch slabs of foam tucked into the box but some of them quite nice.  The one in the pics is typical.  The inside is about 9x9x11-1/2" and the walls and lid are about 1-1/3" thick.

We've shipped a few two day mail and have been told that everything was still frozen on arrival.....

If you check with your local vet or medical office I suspect that a lot of these wind up in landfills and you can likely get them for the asking.

Lance


 
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I get em from Omaha Steaks,  albeit a bit pricey (for the cost of the meat), but ooooh so good.....
 
They are about as thick as an Omaha Steaks cooler but the price is sure a lot easier on the heart than what OS charges.

Lance
 
Great heads up, Lance!

Also folks, don't forget to consider any friends in hospital work.

When I worked in a hospital, we got frozen pig skin (Porcine) for skin transplants on burn patients(temporary transplants for life saving purposes).  It was shipped in an Igloo water cooler with dry ice.  We didn't use a lot, but many employees got a free water cooler which would have otherwise ended up in the trash.There were a couple of small punctures in the lid for gas to escape, but those coolers were still great for folks who worked outdoors, and for camping.

My guess would be that hospital supply, lab, and pharmacy workers might be a potential source for whatever they are using today?

Points, Lance!

Good luck and good smoking.
 
Hit the universities as well. My brother makes insulated concrete forms with polystyrene  and portland cement. ASU keeps him stocked with thick foam coolers that they get [who knows what] shipped to them. They are more than willing to recycle, reuse, repurpose them..
 
Great Tip...JJ
 
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