I’ve been looking to buy a couple of Sortimo T-Boxxes for years now, but no matter how long I wait, they’re just not coming to the USA.
Every now and then someone points me to Adam Savage’s video about these (embedded below), asking where to find them. Short answer: you can’t.
Well, you can, it just costs a whole lot of money. There’s one USA specialty van outfitter that lists them, but they don’t really have a sales page.
Unless you’re someone like Adam Savage, you’re not going to be able to easily buy these boxes domestically, and you’ll likely have to spend a small fortune to import them.
Sortimo T-Boxxes aren’t much different from many of the organizers available here in the USA, but they’re a caliber better – if my Bosch L-Boxxes are any indication – and they’re fully modular. Plus, they’re larger than a lot of the small parts organizers I’ve seen.
I just checked, and there is a listing for some of these via Amazon USA, but they’re priced at $99 each. It has a better configuration than shown above, but that’s not what accounts for the price. The seller is likely importing them, rather than buying directly from Sortimo, resulting in an extra markup that you have to pay for.
At Amazon.co.uk, they’re £41, and at Amazon.de, they’re 40 Euros. That’s for the configuration shown above, others cost a little more depending on which style of boxes are included.
Since I have plenty of bins leftover from when I bought lots of L-Boxx-1A organizers, I’ll reconfigure the T-Boxxes as needed. Otherwise I probably would have spent a little more time thinking about the configuration I needed.
I ordered a bunch from Amazon.co.uk, and if it all turns out well I’ll fill ’em up and then buy more.
Amazon.de has them for a little cheaper, but for some reason the Amazon UK shipping was a little more favorable. Plus, if something goes wrong with the order, or the products are damaged, it’ll be easier communicating with Amazon UK customer service. But, Amazon DE probably has some English-speaking customer service reps.
As an aside, I found it curious that Amazon DE has a Beta English-language version of the site that attempts to auto-translate itself .
So, my T-Boxxes are on the way, and I’m hoping for a good experience. The price was a bit steep, but not much more than it would have cost for smaller metal boxes from an industrial supply dealer. I went that path before, and received dented and bent cabinets. The drawers are fine, just not very customizable.
The unit price, after VAT is taken off, is £34.17, or about $46 each. There will be a currency conversion fee applied by my credit card company, and shipping must be taken into account. When all is said and done, I expect for the price to be around $54 per case, unless there are other gotchas and fees to be paid.
The last time I checked with a USA importer a few years ago, they were maybe $85 or so each, plus shipping.
Wish me luck, I’m hoping for the best! Of course that wasn’t the only reason for this post. I know that lots of you have been looking to buy these Sortimo T-Boxxes for as long as I have. Unfortunately, Bosch doesn’t seem to be interested in partnering with Sortimo on their T-Boxxes lineup.
I also figured that I could serve as a guinea pig, to see if they’re worth the hype.
Too bad those fancy docking shelves aren’t available here. But, it should be pretty easy to make a good-looking DIY emulation.
Oh, and I also ordered a Bosch 10.8V circular saw. I can find replacement blades here easily. I was tempted to order the 10.8V grinder, but it doesn’t look like 76 mm (~3″) cutoff wheels with 10 mm arbor holes are easily found.
Buy Now(via Amazon USA – 1 size, limited availability, high price)
Buy Now(via Amazon UK)
Buy Now(via Amazon Germany)