Grade Afrom $109
275 Gal Food-Grade Reconditioned
Triple-rinsed, food-grade prior contents only. Ideal for water, beverages, and edible oils.
See specs →Somerville, MA · Reuse-first
Totes that get a second life, not a landfill.
IBC Boston buys, sells, reconditions, recycles and hauls IBC totes across New England. Same rugged tanks, a fraction of the cost — and a tiny fraction of the carbon.
275 & 330 gallonFood-grade & industrialEmail-only, no sales calls
♻ Reconditioned~60 kg CO₂e saved / tote
Request a quote
Tell us what you need — get a quote today
Buying, selling, reconditioning, or hauling? One short form and we'll reply by email, usually within a business day.
What we do
Four ways we keep totes in circulation.
By the numbers
Reuse isn't a slogan here. It's the entire business model.
~60 kg
CO₂e avoided per reused tote vs. new build.
100%
Of recoverable totes washed, tested & returned to service.
2 sizes
275 & 330 gallon — the workhorses of bulk liquid.
0
Phone numbers. We work entirely by email and on-site.
The IBC Boston difference
See your reuse impact, live.
Every tote you reuse instead of buying new keeps carbon, water, plastic and energy out of the system. Move the slider and watch your footprint shrink — then turn the number into an order.
Reuse Impact Calculator
How many IBC totes are you reusing instead of buying new?
reused totes
Estimates use conservative HDPE + steel life-cycle figures. Your mileage varies by tote size and prior contents — but the direction is always the same: reuse wins.
720 kg
CO₂e emissions avoided — like 34 tree-years of carbon capture.
2,160 L
Process water conserved — roughly 33 showers.
216 kg
Virgin HDPE kept in service and out of landfill.
1,140 kWh
Manufacturing energy not spent making new containers.
Stock & grades
View all products →Pick the tote for the job.
Grade Bfrom $79
275 Gal Industrial
Washed industrial totes for non-potable use: rainwater, compost tea, dust control, brine.
See specs →Grade Bfrom $129
330 Gal Industrial
Larger footprint for high-volume storage and bulk liquid handling operations.
See specs →Why reused beats new
The greenest tote is the one that already exists.
A new IBC embodies the carbon of virgin HDPE resin, smelted steel, and a factory's worth of energy. Reuse that container and you avoid nearly all of it. We make reuse the obvious, affordable default — for your budget and the planet.
- ✓ Triple-rinsed, pressure-tested, graded & labeled
- ✓ Documented prior contents on every tote
- ✓ Food-grade and industrial options
- ✓ Nothing usable crushed; nothing crushed buried
"We treat a used tote as an asset to be kept in service — not waste to be replaced."
That single principle decides what we buy, how we recondition, and when we finally regrind.
Real totes, real reuse
A working yard, not a catalog render.
What you see here is the actual stock that flows through our Somerville hub: rows of 275s and 330s coming off the wash line, staged by grade, waiting for the next dock that needs them. Every one of these started as someone else's "empty problem" — and is on its way to a second, third, or tenth working life.
When you buy from a stocked, reconditioned yard instead of ordering virgin units from a plant, the lead times shrink, the freight legs shorten, and the carbon you avoid is real and measurable — roughly 60 kg of CO₂e per tote kept in service.
Know what you're buying
Anatomy of the tote we put back to work.
An intermediate bulk container — IBC for short — is a cube-shaped tank that moves between roughly 110 and 550 gallons of liquid in a single forkliftable unit. The two sizes that do almost all the real work are the 275 and the 330 gallon. Understanding the four parts is the fastest way to know exactly what reuse is saving.
The bottle is blow-molded high-density polyethylene (HDPE), usually translucent so you can read the fill level at a glance. The cage is galvanized tubular steel that carries stacking loads and shields the bottle from impact. The pallet is a steel, composite, or plastic base rated for 4-way forklift entry. At the base sits a 2-inch discharge valve (butterfly or ball); up top a 6-inch screw cap handles filling, venting, and cleaning access.
Here is the reuse insight that drives our whole business: the galvanized steel cage and pallet routinely outlast many fill cycles, and the HDPE bottle, once washed and pressure-tested, performs identically to a new one for the vast majority of applications. The energy-intensive manufacturing — resin polymerization and steel forming — already happened once. Reuse simply lets that single set of factory steps serve trip after trip instead of being repeated for each new container.
275 vs. 330 at a glance
The two workhorses, side by side.
Same footprint, same fittings, different height and capacity. Both fit standard pallet racking and a box-truck floor, so the choice usually comes down to how much volume you need per pallet position versus the clearance you have overhead.
| Spec | 275 gallon | 330 gallon |
|---|---|---|
| Capacity | 275 gal / 1040 L | 330 gal / 1250 L |
| Footprint | 48 × 40 in | 48 × 40 in |
| Overall height | ~46 in | ~53 in |
| Empty weight | ~115–120 lb | ~155 lb |
| Loaded weight (water) | ~2,400 lb | ~2,900 lb |
| Discharge valve | 2 in butterfly / ball | 2 in butterfly / ball |
| Fill cap | 6 in screw cap | 6 in screw cap |
| Forklift entry | 4-way | 4-way |
| Best for | Tight height / weight limits | Maximum volume per position |
48×40 in
Shared footprint — both sizes rack and load identically.
2 in
Standard bottom discharge valve, butterfly or ball.
6 in
Screw-top fill cap for filling, venting and cleaning.
8.34 lb/gal
Water weight — multiply by specific gravity for your load.
How it works
From your message to totes on your dock.
Four steps, zero phone calls. The whole process is built to be fast, written, and honest — so you always have a paper trail and never a runaround.
Send one short form
Tell us size, grade, quantity and your town. No account, no phone tag — it routes straight to a real person.
Get a written quote
We confirm stock, prior contents and freight, then reply by email — usually within a business day.
Approve & schedule
Say yes and we lock a delivery or pickup window across New England, batched by route to keep freight lean.
Totes on your dock
Each unit arrives washed, tested, graded and labeled with its documented history. Empties? We collect those too.
Who puts them to work
One container, dozens of second lives.
Part of why reused totes are so sustainable is sheer versatility — a single unit serves farms, breweries, factories and town yards across New England without ever touching a landfill.
Farms & growers
Rainwater capture, compost tea, fertilizer and irrigation reservoirs — Grade B industrial does the job for less.
Breweries & food
Food-grade 275s for process water, juice, syrup and edible oils, with documented FDA-compliant prior contents.
Manufacturers
Bulk ingredient and process-liquid handling with a closed loop that takes your empties back off the floor.
Municipal & trades
Road brine, dust control, washdown water and ballast — rugged, forkliftable, and ready the day they land.
Looking for ideas? Our guide on 37 practical uses for a reused tote covers everything from aquaponics to maple-sap collection.
Quick answers
The questions we hear most.
Still stuck? The form above reaches a real person — by email, always. Or browse the full FAQ.
What's the difference between a 275 and a 330 gallon tote?
Both share the standard 48 × 40 inch footprint, so they rack and load identically. The 275-gallon (1040 L) stands about 46 inches tall and weighs ~115–120 lb empty; the 330-gallon (1250 L) stands about 53 inches and weighs ~155 lb empty. Choose 330 for maximum volume per pallet position, 275 when height or weight is constrained.
Are your used totes safe for drinking water?
Only our Grade A food-grade totes are appropriate for potable use — these previously held FDA-approved edible contents and were triple-rinsed and sanitized. We always recommend a final fresh-water rinse before potable use, and every tote is labeled with its documented prior contents and grade.
Do you buy empty totes as well as sell them?
Yes — buying and selling are two halves of the same loop. We purchase clean, structurally sound empty 275s and 330s across New England, recondition them, and put them back into service. Tell us quantity, prior contents and location and we'll send a per-tote offer by email.
How fast can I get totes, and do you really not call?
Local Greater Boston orders from in-stock grades often ship within a business day or two; larger or specific-history orders depend on what's on the wash line. And no — we work entirely by email and on-site. You'll get a real, written answer instead of a sales call.
Do you deliver across all of New England?
Yes — we ship from our Somerville, MA hub to all six New England states. Greater Boston runs are fast and frequent; longer hauls into Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine are scheduled by route and quoted with your order to keep freight efficient.
Learn
All guides →Tote knowledge, no fluff.
Got totes to move, buy, or recycle?
Send one form. Get a real answer by email — no call centers, no runaround.
Start your quote