I'm sure taht you can find such organizers in any of the Big Box stores but Sears also has garage organizers which are quite nice. In line with that, I bought some shock absorbing floor mats at HD which are great for reducing leg fatigue. It comes on a roll and runs abut $4/ foot, IIRC.

It's important to control the new stuff coming in as well so the clutter isn't growing. I often just declutter on the fly now, e.g. if I open a closet I sometimes end up just scanning through it for things to get rid of. I think we can get so used to looking at the same stuff that we don't really *see it* and question whether it serves a purpose anymore or not. I never really strive for perfection in my organizing because it would just bog me down with indecision, so I try to focus on doing anything that will help the situation, even if that means getting rid of just a few things at a time, tidying up a shelf or closet here and there, going through a box of things. when I'm working on a project I do end up with a lot of clutter around it that I don't put away because I want things at hand, but I also do a bit of an inventory from time to time and pick out materials, tools, bits and pieces that I know I'm finished with and put them away to reduce the clutter, and one of the things that motivates me to keep going with a project is just being able to gather up all the materials at the end and put them back where they belong (tools back in the garage etc). Garages are hard though because we don't spend a lot of time in them. I've made some strides with ours to get it more organized by putting up tool/shadow boards and that has made it much easier to find the most used tools in there. But we do hold onto a lot of materials for future projects too, pieces of wood, metal left over from other projects and they do come in handy but also take up a lot of space. I think anything you do to make progress is a good thing, even small changes can make the most disorganized areas more functional This post was edited by trancegemini_wa on Sat, Mar 2, 13 at 1:05

it's just so daunting a task that we last for a few days then give up. Then it's worse because he just drags everything back out and when we work up the nerve to tackle it again we just are re-doing what was already done. Organizing is a process, not something that is ever "done". The Shaker motto is: "A place for everything, and everything in its place" ... you need to start by making a place for everything, even if it's temporary, so that you don't backslide too badly. ORGANIZING METHODS: There are two basic ways to handle tools ... each has its strong and weak points. Which would suit him better? Discuss this with him, because having a system that works the way he works is critical to his maintaining it. 1 - Group by function, so all wrenches are hung together, all hammers, etc. Advantage - Fewer duplicates. Disadvantage - Have to pick tools to take to the job if you can't bring the job to the bench, have to put tools back at least weekly, or it all falls apart. WORKS BEST FOR naturally organized person, a "handyman" who works in a single area, one who has wall space to make it all visible. Pegboard and hooks would make this work. BIG pegboards. 2 - Sort tools into labelled, task-specific toolboxes so the "plumbing" box has the pipe wrenches, the washers, etc. The "wood work" box has the rasps, the wood chisels, etc. (a variant of this would be to have different workbenches or drawers or pegboards, each with the tools for that task) Advantage - Faster to pick and store. If you are working on a faucet, you grab the "plumbing" box and it has the pipe tape, the washers, the wrenches, the valve-puller, the fittings, and the commonly used screwdrivers for faucets. At the end of the repair, you replace the used supplies, put it all back in the box and put the box on the shelf. Disadvantage - Duplicate tools needed, usually the common types. You can get around the duplicates by having one box of the generic tools: screwdrivers, common wrenches, a good hammer, etc. It means grabbing two boxes for any job - the generic tools and the specialty box. WORKS BEST FOR "handyman" who works in several locations and can't take the work to the workshop. I got used to this working on rental properties. Also works well for the person who finds the first method to be too "nit-picky" ... just dumping it all into the box may be enough organization for them. ======================= It may make sense for any power tool to have its own toolbox with its blades or bits, chuck key and extension cord, and ear and eye protection, etc. When I grab the "multi-tool'" box, I get everything I need to use the tool. When I grab the door planer box, I get everything. Ditto for the drills, the circular saw, etc. ======================= GETTING THERE - for either system - starts out by finding and sorting it so you know what you have. And it assumes you have some shelf space. FIRST STEP: Get a bunch of bins - shoeboxes work well - label them with categories and start tossing things into them. This is a speed exercise. You are doing a fast top-level sort, trying to clear the clutter into small chunks of clutter. Pliers and wrenches Screwdrivers Hammers Drill bits, hole saws (anything you attach to a drill) Scrapers, chisels, sanders, rasps (anything that shapes wood) Fasteners - all rivets, screws, nails, bolts, etc. (recycle plastic jars for this) Power tools and accessories (blades, guides, etc.) Files and rasps Painting tools Drywall repair Demolition (sledges, prybars, wrecking bars) Put the boxes on the shelves. MAINTENANCE for this phase is just tossing things back in the right box. It may be enough of an improvement that you can stop here. SECOND STEP PREP: If you are going for the "all on the wall", next you put up the pegboards and also shelves for boxes of things that can't be hung. If you are going to do the project-specific boxes, find toolboxes. Any box should be large enough to hold ALL the tools for that task, but not much bigger. My plumbing box holds the torch and a small snake as well as the wrenches, so it's honking ginormous. THIRD STEP IMPLEMENTING: Here's where the project box method makes it easy. Any time you have a certain kind of project, grab the box for it. If there isn't a box, go through the bins from Step 1 and collect your tools and fill a box for it. If you are using method 1, sort each box into finer categories if it makes sense: phillips versus straight versus funny-shaped screwdrivers ... pipe wrenches versus Hang them up by type. ============= As time permits, sort out the fasteners into smaller categories. The trick is to NOT get too finely divided with the main containers because that is its own sort of clutter. If I grab a box that says "drywall screws" from the shelf and inside it there are 17 containers with various sizes, that's great. If those 17 containers are on the shelf, no matter how nicely labelled they are, I have to look at every container to make sure I have all the drywall screws.

Some of those prefab organizers are expensive. We knew someone who was having their kitchen remodeled and asked if we could have the old base cabinets and formica countertop. We mounted a 12" (approx) length of countertop and cabinets centered along the back of our garage. Lawnmower and snow thrower go to the right of the countertop against the back of the garage. Hubby built lots of shelves (high and low) out of scrap lumber he had in areas where their jutting out wouldn't get in the way of getting in and out of cars. Fishing stuff is on one shelf, car care stuff on another, lawn care stuff on another, etc. Along half of one long wall, hubby put two rows of 2"x 4" wooden strips - one low, one high. Then he put in longish nails (they stick out about 1.5" from the wood strip) along the front of those strips and wrote above the nails in marker (broom, snow shovel, hoe, rake, spade, pruners, power cord etc.) so the equipment always was hung back in its proper spot once you were finished using it. If there wasn't a hole in the implement to fit over a nail, he drilled one in the implement to stick the nail through. He has a 4 ft. high black tool cabinet in the back of the garage (left side of countertop) with basic tools (we have duplicate tools all over the house because we don't like running down to the depths of the basement every time we want a hammer or screwdriver). One other helpful feature we added in the past couple of years is a few of those plastic uility cabinets with two front doors that you can get at Home Depot. There are two sizes of them, one about 3 feet high and one about 6 feet high. They're less than $50 each and often go on sale. We are very pleased with them. We have several of those along one long side of the garage (opposite the side that has all the hanging tools). We also have several on our back porch for some of our sporting equipment. We only have a two car garage, but believe we have done a lot to maximize most of the usable space.