Preparing Your Site for Container Delivery

A container delivery is a truck carrying twenty or forty feet of steel that has to reach a specific spot on your property and set it down accurately. When that fails, it fails at the site, with the driver present and the clock running — and the costs of a return trip land on the buyer.

Almost every failed delivery traces back to something that was knowable in advance: a gate too narrow, a turn too tight, ground too soft, a slope too steep, or overhead lines in the way. None of these are difficult to spot. They just have to be looked for before the truck is dispatched rather than when it arrives.

This guide covers what to check, in the order that matters.

Start at the road and walk the route the truck will take, thinking about a vehicle far longer and less manoeuvrable than anything you normally drive onto the property.

Width is the first constraint. As a working guide, a delivery for a 40ft container wants a minimum corridor width in the region of 14 feet along the whole approach — not just at the gate, but past every fence post, tree, parked vehicle, and building corner on the way. Measure the narrowest point, not the average.

Length matters more than most people expect, because of how containers are delivered. Tilt-bed delivery, the common method, works by tilting the trailer and sliding the container off while the truck pulls forward. That requires a substantial straight run — commonly around 65 feet of clear straight-line space for a 40ft container, measured from where the container will sit, in line with the direction of approach. A site with plenty of room but no straight approach can still be undeliverable.

Overhead clearance is the one that gets forgotten, and it's the most dangerous. A tilt-bed trailer rises high during unloading — considerably higher than the truck's travelling height. Power lines, phone lines, tree limbs, gantries and building overhangs along the route and above the placement spot all need checking. Overhead power lines in particular are a stop-work issue, not an obstacle to squeeze past.

Turning space, gradient and surface complete the picture. Tight turns need more room than they appear to; steep approaches are a real limitation for a loaded truck; and soft verges will bog a heavy vehicle regardless of how firm the destination pad is.

Four requirements govern the placement spot itself, and they're worth taking in turn.

Level is the one with consequences beyond appearance. A container that sits out of level twists slightly, and a twisted container has doors that don't align — they jam, or won't latch, or won't seal. On a refrigerated unit, a poor door seal is an ongoing energy cost as well as a nuisance. Getting the pad level is the difference between doors that work for twenty years and doors that fight you from day one.

Firm means the ground will carry the load without settling unevenly. A loaded container concentrates substantial weight onto its four corner castings — the load is not spread across the footprint. Ground that seems solid underfoot can still settle under that kind of point loading, particularly after rain.

Dry matters because standing water accelerates corrosion from underneath, where you won't see it until it's advanced. A spot that collects water after heavy rain is the wrong spot, even if it's convenient.

Clear means clear of obstructions at ground level and above — and clear enough that the doors can open fully. Doors on a shipping container swing wide, and siting a container so the doors open into a fence or wall is a common and entirely avoidable mistake.

Containers don't always need a formal foundation, but they benefit from something between the steel and the soil.

Concrete piers or blocks under the corner castings are the most common approach and generally the most cost-effective. They put support exactly where the load is concentrated, lift the container clear of ground moisture, and allow air to circulate underneath — which is what prevents the slow corrosion that comes from sitting directly on damp earth. For most placements this is enough.

A full concrete pad is the more substantial option, appropriate for permanent installations, for containers that will be heavily loaded, or where you want a clean working surface around and under the unit. It's more expensive and takes time to cure, which needs factoring into delivery scheduling.

Compacted gravel is a reasonable middle option: it drains well, spreads load better than bare soil, and is quick to prepare. It needs to be genuinely compacted and level rather than simply tipped and raked.

In poor ground — very soft soil, deep sand, or fill — piers may need to reach down to a firmer stratum, and in serious cases piles are the answer. That's a point at which an engineer's input is worth the cost, particularly for a permanent installation.

Footing size isn't arbitrary — it follows from what the ground beneath can bear.

The principle is simple: the weaker the soil, the larger the footing needed to spread the same load to a pressure the ground can carry. Firm ground or bedrock supports a container's corner loads on a modest footing. Soft clay requires a substantially larger one to distribute that weight without settling. This is why copying a neighbour's setup can go wrong — their soil may not be your soil.

Two practical consequences. First, if the ground is questionable, find out its bearing capacity rather than guessing; for a permanent installation this is a worthwhile step. Second, watch for differential settlement — the failure mode isn't usually the whole container sinking, it's one corner sinking further than the others, which reintroduces the twist-and-door problem discussed earlier.

Ground conditions also change with the seasons. A pad that's rock-solid in August may behave differently in a wet spring, and expansive clays move with moisture content. Prepare for the worst condition the site sees, not the condition it's in on the day you look at it.

Two details that cost nothing at preparation time and matter for the life of the container.

Grade the area so water runs away from the container rather than pooling under it. Even a slight fall is enough. A container sitting in a shallow depression collects water every time it rains, and the underside — which you will never inspect — corrodes first.

Leave air space underneath. Piers or blocks that lift the container a few inches allow air to move under the floor, which keeps the underside dry between rains and dramatically slows corrosion. A container set directly onto soil or grass traps moisture against the steel permanently. This single detail probably does more for a container's service life than anything else in this guide.

A reefer adds siting constraints that dry-container advice never mentions, and getting them wrong is awkward to fix after placement.

The power connection is at the machinery end, and the container arrives with a fitted cable of finite length — commonly in the region of 60 feet. Your receptacle must be within reach of the machinery end of the container as it will actually sit. This means the container's orientation is not a free choice: door direction and power drop location have to be decided together. Work out both before delivery day, because rotating a placed container means another truck visit. Our reefer container electrical requirements guide covers the supply specification itself.

The refrigeration unit also needs airflow around its condenser to reject heat, so don't site it tight against a wall, a fence, or another container on the machinery end. Restricting that airflow makes the unit work harder continuously, which shows up on the power bill and in accelerated wear — see what a reefer container actually costs to own for why that matters more than it seems. Shade over the unit, where practical, works in the opposite and helpful direction.

Run this before delivery is scheduled, not the morning of.

Walk the full route from the public road to the placement spot and measure the narrowest point. Confirm there's a straight approach long enough for a tilt-bed unload. Look up along the entire route and above the placement spot for lines and limbs. Check the gradient of the approach and the firmness of any verge the truck must cross. Confirm the pad is level, drains away, and is prepared to carry corner loads. Check the doors will have room to open fully once placed. For a reefer, confirm the power drop reaches the machinery end in the orientation you've chosen, and that the condenser has clear air.

Then tell the delivery coordinator what you found — including anything you're unsure about. Site constraints identified in advance can usually be worked around with the right equipment or approach. The same constraints discovered by a driver at your gate become a failed delivery and a return charge.

If you're still choosing the container itself, container grades explained covers what the condition terminology in listings actually means, and our full catalog covers what's available. Delivery is quoted separately from the unit price, based on your location and the container's size — and a site walkthrough before you reserve makes that quote more accurate too.