As someone who still has the 33" wide WP gold fridge left by the POs of my previous house (even after remodeling the kitchen there), I know exactly how you feel about being dispassionate about a fridge.

Get the 30" if it looks balanced in the kitchen. Save energy.

If you have to move, take it with you. (That's what people do around here.)

If the opening is 36", I'd get as big as will fill the space. It will allow you shop less often and will also be there for leftovers and entertaining. If you ever do sell, a 30" wide fridge is a no go for a lot of buyers. In our part of the country appliances all stay in the house, so it would factor in. I know other parts of the country don't leave appliances, but if you had made the opening smaller, they'd still have to undo your 6" modification.
We went from a good size s x s in our last house to a smaller one in this house and were miserable. We knew we were putting in an all fridge all freezer set, so bought those in advance of the reno when we had a big bbq to prepare for and used them in the garage.
After the reno, we got rid of the smaller s x s since it was inefficient and on its last legs and are making do with "only" a 30" fridge and 30" freezer now. Once you go big, it is hard to go back. You think you don't need the 36" but there will be times that you do. I like to cook big batches and then freeze leftovers and also to shop big on sales. I use all of our set now and rarely have any open spaces. Costco is further away than it used to be, so I stock up and hate running out of things.

I have a 36 sub-zero which seems "big" but I really think I wouldn't go any smaller than that. There have been times in which I think darn I should have gone bigger. If you're planning on a built in fridge like Leibherr you should really look at them in person and see if it fits your needs. I would say 30 would be too small and highly recommend getting the 36 because it's better to have the space and not need it, rather than needing it and not having it. Good luck.

We, too, live in a 1700+s.f. house in a very nice area and our kitchen is also 10 x 18. We happily ditched, er donated, our old sxs which we hated.

We are thrilled with our 36"wide f.d. 25 c.f. LG. It has no water or ice on the outside, which would drive me crazy. We are part time empty nesters as our last dd in in college, far away.

But wait, there's more! We even bought an undercounter Elux fridge drawer unit-another 6 c.f. of space. We keep soda and waters there, in an out of traffic spot-good for entertaining.

Today I bought romaine hearts on sale for .99 pk of 3 and I could bc I have the space.

Liebherr is great but it's better for tallish ppl altho remodelfla has one.

Get a 36 for sure.

36" for sure. I wouldn't want to buy a home that size if it only had a 30" fridge opening.

We are two, in a 1400 sq.ft., so so neighborhood, with a 36" Liebherr. Our kitchen is the same size as yours... maybe a bit smaller. It's perfect. I don't need anymore (except when I super pack the freezer after a huge Costco run) but wouldn't want any less. We love to entertain and it hold what I need. Get the 36"... you'll love it.

I think for most people, a bigger fridge is a plus when buying a house. That being said, a second fridge in the garage or basement would nutralize this issue for resale - and it doesn't have to be a nice fridge if its located outside the kitchen.

Some ideas... get the 30" fridge and put molding around it that can easily be removed to have possibility of larger fridge at a later date. I don't think 6" is big enough for useful shelves (6" might hold Cd's). I have seen wine racks in a small space like that.

I have a tall 30" all fridge, which I love, but also an all freezer, a garage freezer and 24" fridge drawers. I'd want a 36" if it was a fridge/freezer and the only cooler in the house. You didn't mention whom you might be entertaining besides the quadrupeds who make themselves at home to the point of being given shelf space in the fridge. Any platters? Gigantabirds?

That said, I made do with a half sized fridge for three of us plus entertaining in a climate where roots didn't have to go in the fridge, and a location where there was a little store on the corner where we could pick up more milk and eggs, and standard produce, six days a week.

If the Liebherr is enough actual storage for you (and it is a well arranged design), go ahead and get that, and make the bookcase detachable. You could even make it out of lexan or something that would go with your glass and just screw it into place. So long as it's easy to remove if/when you want to sell and buyers resist the size of the fridge, you're set. Buyer's won't pass up the house because of the fridge, per se, though given an equivalent they'll pass up the perceived need for a remodel. Just make sure the buyer's agent knows what an easy fix it is.

Another vote, from a shortie, for the 36" Liebherr! At 11' x 14, my kitchen is slightly smaller than yours. Even so, my 36" Liebhy does not dominate. Although I honestly like your idea of the book shelves, I wouldn't choose 6" of book shelf width over the larger fridge. And especially so if you are thinking built in vs freestanding. IMHO, go with DH on the large fridge and be happy! :-)

Is the house amenable to more than two people, in ways other than square footage? If it is only going to be a couple, the 30" vs. 36" may not be as big a deal as it would be in a house that could hold 4 people readily.

I would say if you have no plans to move, (but may) do the one you want (30?) unless your husband really objects. (Although the 30" will be cheaper :)) It sounds as if the existing cavity will be reversible. A partly full refrigerator is not very efficient, and a freezer that is not pretty full confuses the thermostat or something like that.

After reading this forum for a few years I realize my partner and I are apparently freakish in our kitchen habitus, so take that into account while reading my answer.

Our household is also two adults and two quadripeds. The kitchen is 12'x12' square. I know you're a straight shooter, Mindstorm, so I won't mince words: we were raised in European households, and we would be aghast at the waste implied by a fridge bigger than 30" for just two people. We don't buy processed foods and we shop almost daily. We don't buy many pre-packaged foods. We don't freeze much besides cuts of meat. Plus, I find that Americans put lots of things in the fridge that don't need to go in there (jam! garlic! peanut butter! syrup! potatoes!). It baffles me, but then, so do people who find a 2,000sft house "small".

So the real question is: how American are you in your refrigeration storage habits? Do you shop daily or weekly or monthly? Do you bring groceries in by totebag or by carload? How much packaged/preprocessed food do you buy? (Packaging takes up an inordinate amount of fridge space.) Do you stock up on things in bulk that need to be refrigerated (beer? colas?)? What takes up the most square footage of your current fridge? (For us, the answer would be milk, beer, mineral water and bulky veggies like kale, beets, lettuces.)

I know the standard answer around here is bigger, bigger, bigger -- but do consider what your actual lifestyle requires and fit your appliances to it. Here in human-scaled New England, a huge fridge might be the jarring equivalent of a three-car garage slapped onto a bungalow.

At any rate, I adore my 30" Liebherr. Adore it. Sang its praises just this morning in another thread:

Here is a link that might be useful: somewhere in here I write my Liebherr a love note

Dear Baffled,

The things you don't put in the fridge go bad if left out where I live. Hence, into the fridge they go. Moldy jam is really nasty. Moldy potatoes are nastier.

But she said they don't need the storage of the bigger fridge. Trust her.

There is One reason I might be tempted to go with the 36" Liebherr rather than the 30 and that is the external drawer configuration available on the 36 that is not available on the 30, which has a hinged freezer door with internal bins.

Keep in mind that you have a 36" now and have not lived with a 30". Once you buy it and go through the modifications, it is a lot more expensive to go back if it turns out to be too small. You know that 36" will hold all you need, but a 30" is the unknown.
Part of why a bigger fridge is important is to not have to go grocery shopping every day. It would eat up too much time or gas to do so where I live. I used to live closer to the store and would go on my way to or from my house or just walk there and back. The current house is more than a
mile in any direction to a grocery store. Carrying big amounts is not feasible. Being back at work, I also do not have the time to park and wait on line every day. Often, I plan out the night's meal in the a.m. or come home from work and try to figure out what I can make to feed us without another trip to the store. Our sons have frequent playdates, so we need supplies on hand. Produce such as fruit goes bad left out and stays fresh longer in the fridge.

Keep in mind the Lieb might not be as deep as your old one. (that's a good thing in my opinion, but if you have things like 9x13 pans the may not go the direction you used to put them and therefore take more room)

Oh goodness me! You really are fantastic to respond so kindly and so generously to a prodigal child! I'm going to be brief just now coz having to read and respond on me iphone. I'm one of the storm afflicted NEers who is still awaiting power after the storm. No heat, no hw, no electricity, no - wait for it- wireless!!!! and no fridge since saturday. So no laptop either hence all transactions on the phone Trying to save power and sticking to low bw non #G network.

Will give full answers tom from work when i can reference a post to properly respond to all you v kind respondents.

But in a nutshell - we have a 36" unit now. Mostly it stores all the food thats gone bad cos its got lost in the fridge. We dont shop bulk - we are (well ok *I* am) vegetarian and I don't understand buying food in bulk. I buy milk for tea, by which I mean we buy about a litre or so of milk and as often as not it goes bad before we finish it. I don't buy lots of anything but fruit which we dont keep inside anyhow. The only thing i tend to have a lot of is that we buy frsh beets or other greens and have a bunch of leafy things i wouldnt want to squash getting in the fridge. Shop a few times a week - every 2-3 days or so. So not everyday but never do i have a weeks worth of fresh vegetables. (unless they got overlooked and are toast anyhow)

That last + another point about efficiency is really part of why i want to rock the boat here wirh the patchwork on the 36" slot. I think we do see a lot of waste from our bad habits (or is it a bad fridge?) and wonder if a smaller fridge wont be a better choice all the way around.
A lotnof you raised points that struck a chord w me that i'll respond to from the screen when I can see.

In the meantime, i thank you all from the bottom of my heart for responding with great pts to think about. And one more favour: if ya'll could pl just give one extra spin while you touch your nose for me when you do your nightly turn for goodluck so I can get power back i'll be so grateful. I really never thought that i'd be facing a third night w/o power heat or electricity today when i made the post above. Save the prayers for the real emergencies for those at war w/o jobs w/o food or shelter or for the earthuake victims. Dont want to detract energies from the really needy but i'd really love to be warm again! :-)

Apologies, friends, I feared my post would make folks feel defensive -- truly not my intent. I suspect Mindstorm & partner live quite similarly to us, with similar food habits in a neighboring northeastern urban clime, thus wanted to offer her my honest perspective. I don't condemn anyone for having a large fridge and understand that it is often necessary in given family size, lifestyle and location choices. Please no stress!

Mindstorm, here's wishing you at least a warm oven for the nonce. :-)

I can see that a 30" fridge plus some shelving would be very desirable. I would have loved to have had a space for a tall bookcase or shelving. However, I'd be reluctant to get locked into a configuration that wouldn't allow a 36" fridge for a larger family if the house and neighborhood would support a family, especially 4 (doubt more than that in your sq footage).

Can you add a shelving unit that can be stabilized and functional for you, but easily removed without any serious damage if your needs or a future owners needs require it (just screws to a stud and maybe some brackets)? Does it have to be all one or the other?

You shop a lot like us and we are a family of four with a 36" inch Miele. I have no doubt a 30" would be fine for you. Mine keeps things nicer way longer than the piece of junk here before. And the shallower depth and bright lights mean things don't get lost in the back until they become science experiments. The old was a top freezer and I had to get on my knees to find most things. This one is heaven.

You won't get a lot of books in the 5" (assuming you need a 3/4" or 1 inch piece of divider), but maybe enough of your favorites or odd shaped ones that don't have a good place in a different place.

Hope you get your power back soon!

Ok, good time now. This power outtage is killing me - my poor cold house hasn't seen an iota of heat in nearly 3 days. My poor quadrupeds are wondering what is wrong with us - they keep leading us to their favorite spots - the now-cold toe-kick heater or the formerly-warm tiled floors and suggest that I just uncold them! Wish I could explain to their poor befuddled expressions what is going on.

Ok, back to the fridge. Which, admittedly, I really don't feel like shopping for now. (Would much rather be thinking about fireplaces, heaters, underfloor heating, toekick heaters, gas heat, oil heat, solar heating, thermal cycles, hot air, hot water. Well, you get my drift.)

CP, we're a mixed breed family, I guess. I hail from Europe - well, England to be precise - and also believe that life in general here is super-sized. My husband is a yank (in my family's parlance). Whatever; he's an American.

At this point in time, I think we are something of a hybrid. I've surgically removed all traces from his composition to buy things in quantity just 'coz they're cheaper-by-the-dozen but I can't say that we are all that frugal or that disciplined that we purchase based on a strict meal plan. So, we do end up with an assortment of a few vegetables just coz they looked freshest and most tempting that day but with no known method to cook them together or think they'd be good together in the same meal. Still, I don't like the idea of buying food in large volume - i have deep seated antipathy for the notion. Our groceries and esp. refridgeratables rarely exceed 2 totes.
We shop for a 2-3 days at a go and don't buy multiples of anything but things like beets (with their greens) or carrots with theirs etc. Those are the things that in some ways really demand volume and make me wonder what a comfortable width is.

My feeling is that a 30" fridge will have the width that the fridge part of my 36" SxS doesn't offer so that the greens won't have to be folded. Beyond that it is the usual culprits, a quart or so of milk, some cheese, 6 eggs ... drinks. And the ubiquitous and dreaded leftovers! This last is the biggest mystery as I don't know how to upper-bound that.

However, I don't know if the loss of depth, which, as marcydc points out is usually beneficial, needs to be mitigated with increased width or if it usually just lost volume anyhow (in terms of the items that get to the back and get forgotten).

In many ways, it is CP's question about Americanization that puts the finger on the real pulse of my query here, to wit: just how anti-American is a 30" Leibherr. It sounds from the flood of answers up-top that the answer is "very".

Pal makes a good point about empty fridges. Fact is that even this awkward sxs thing is usually only about 1/3 full at any time. What really does tend to fill up is the vegetable section - and what I'd really like to get is the Miele with its humidity control options therein. Don't know if...

"sort of puritanical that way about his wine"....that is really funny given the Puritan view on wine.

Another data point: we have a family of 5 and we just bought a 33 inch wide standard-depth, French door refrigerator. I find that I have just enough room in it for everyday living but will be cramped for sure at a particularly large holiday.

I have lived in Europe and remember the little refrigerator my host family had in England--it was about the size of a two-drawer filing cabinet, really. I would think a 30 inch would satisfy your needs, but then I do not know these particular models.

Maybe you could take some of the foods you normally store in a fridge to the showroom and put them in the floor model. Take a couple of pictures to think over.

Fact is that even this awkward sxs thing is usually only about 1/3 full at any time. What really does tend to fill up is the vegetable section.

AHA!!! Herein lies the answer. We yanks knew we'd beat it out of you sooner or later with our eggs by the gross and bushels of apples!

A 36" SxS is a very small fridge by American standards (but a large, if ill arranged, freezer). Since you don't even remember how you entertain, you don't need to worry about large platters and gigantabirds. If you're not even filling up your current fridge section, even with trying to preserve your beet tops, I, in my role as sage prognosticator, am convinced that you absolutely don't need a bigger fridge than the 30" Liebherr. Even the 24" Liebherr seems to hold a lot because it's well designed. The 30" one should be adequate for the two of you. And even people who can't explain heat flow and triple points (let alone the dreaded exothermic reaction that confirms utter and unusual failure in the kitchen) know how to use ice chests and gel pack chilling trays for large scale catering. You can resort to low tech should the occasion arise.

Regarding resale, that's a hazy five years away. At which point you'll have a ten year old kitchen. Which is very specific in its tastes and style. I flat out promise you that the size of the fridge isn't going to make or break a sale, and will have little impact at all. The new owners will probably want the latest in Disneyland Euro frou-frou --because it's inevitable that the buyers are never the ones who just love your aesthetic -- and will redo at least the surfaces, anyway, so if they feel they have to redo the fridge, it's no big deal.

I used to live in a 1600 s.f. house. It was plenty of room for a family of four. Not deluxe. There was one bathroom upstairs and one downstairs, rather than any kind of fancy master suite, but there were two bathrooms. No kids running to the neighbors' in an emergency. ;) You have two bathrooms too. That makes it a family house. But I still don't think the fridge is a big deal one way or the other. Get the bigger one if you want the exterior drawers.

BTW, I do like my Miele with the fancy temp drawers, but, especially since you shop often, I don't think they'd make a big difference. Liebherr has some kind of freshness system too.

I feel for your four-chilly-footed friends who don't understand why the warm spots have gone cold. If you have time for amusing books of no great intellectual worth (i.e., brain vacation), I think you might get a kick out of Enslaved by Ducks. :)

P.S., Peanut no offense taken. You said you were baffled by why people put jam and potatoes in the fridge. I was just informing. ;) We have very different climates.

When I lived with the dinky fridge I also came home from work past the supermarket and could stop in to pick up a bag of groceries...

There are plastic bin like drawers behind the swing door. This might be really efficient, but ergonomically it's two steps, not one, that's all.

Mindstorm,

Having now owned 2 fully integrated, 36" FD Liebherr's, here's just a bit more info which may be of help to you (if you're considering integrated over freestanding, that is):

I'm living quite happily with a Liebherr HCB2062. That's a 36" FD integrated and paneled unit with Biofresh. It's net capacity is 18.7 cu.ft. (refrigerator =12.8; freezer = 6) Previously, I had the HC2062, which is pretty much the same unit without Biofresh. It's net capacity is 19.4 cu.ft. (refrigerator = 13.4; freezer = 6). (I note that Liebherr, on their own suggestion, switched out my HC2062 and,upgraded me to the HCB2062 at their own cost. And all this occurred post-warranty, because there had been too many problems with the ice maker and temperature controls of my first generation unit. Tell me why I'm such a champion of this company!)

It might help to know that before, my reno, I was also living quite happily, as a single person, with a $600 Maytag that had a total gross capacity of only 14 cu ft. Like you, I shop frequently and I tend to stock my fridge most heavily with fruits, veggies and left-overs. Although I clearly made a small leap in size from the Maytag to the Liebherr, I've never felt that I'm now wasting energy by having "too much" refrigerator -- not even for an empty nester. Instead, what I now have is an extremely quiet, feature-rich, EnergyStar refrigerator which not only keeps my produce remarkably fresh but also allows me to easily find just about anything I put in there at a glance.

Only one more word of note about Liebherr's Biofresh, should you go with it. Although the difference in fridge capacity between it and the non-Biofresh model is slight (from 13.4 to 12.8 cu ft.), I have definitely noticed that difference. That is, the non-Biofresh unit has 3 storage drawers: one big one that runs the entire width of the fridge and 2 smaller ones that are each half the size of the larger. I used to find it pretty easy to organize and store my produce, meats and dairy, etc. in those 3 separate compartments. With the Biofresh unit, however, there are only 2 storage "safes", each half the width of the fridge. With this configuration, I find myself having to make strategic choices on produce storage. And, as much as I really like Biofresh, I haven't figured out whether I prefer it's superior food-keeping ability with slightly reduced capacity over that of the slightly larger non-Biofresh unit -- which, as I've said, did a darn good job of keeping things fresh anyway! Either way, though, I love my Liebherr. :-)

HTH

P.S. I'm sending up and out my very best wishes for a warm-as-toast home for you, DH and the quadrupeds ASAP!

I grocery shop and cook frequently (pretty much daily -- buy what you need that day) and don't need a refrigerator jammed with food. We opted for the 30" liebherr and are a family of 4. I am certain we'll be fine with it.

There are plastic bin like drawers behind the swing door. This might be really efficient, but ergonomically it's two steps, not one, that's all.

1. As to the old WP: think 'beer fridge'.

2. Don't dump it, sell it. Or donate it to a church/shelter/Habitat4Humanity.

3. Perhaps you need a generator more than you need a fridge.

This is a great post and discussion.

Like many of you the thing that takes up the most space ('cept in the dead of winter) in my frig is produce.

Any frig out there that holds a ton of produce and keeps it fresh AND is in the > = 30" width category???

I've just emptied the groceries.

In one of the drawers in my Miele 30" all fridge, set on fruit & veg (you can also choose either/or) are:

Half a dozen pears.
A dozen apples.
A dozen kiwi.
A large starfruit.
Half pint of blueberries.
Large container of wild arugula.
Large container of mesclun blend lettuce.
Small container of basil.
About 10 little flat containers of fresh herbs and dried peppers.
One pound box of mushrooms.
A large but not jumbo celery.
A bunch of scallions.
Two bunches of lovely little baby carrots (no tops).
A bunch of medium size daikon raddishes (no tops).
Two large bunches of red kale, the branching kind.
A watermelon raddish.
One zucchini.
Two small white squash.
One fresh chili pepper.

I might be able to fit a few more small things, but the kale is bulky and I don't want to squash it. (Can't cope with carrot and raddish greens this week so I let them take the drippy things off at the store.)

Elsewhere, I have tomatoes and green beans on the shelf because I was too tired to rearrange. Onions, potatoes, garlic, and bell peppers, a couple of pie pumpkins for lasagna and a butternut squash, plus some more carrots and a few other things are in my Marvel prep fridge drawer. I save the bottom Miele drawer for meat, but one could easily set it for more produce.

I'm not familiar enough with the fridge/freezer combination units to comment on the size of their drawers, but my produce bin is a single drawer, full width, and about 6" tall.

I usually have more produce than can fit in the single drawer (not even including the prep vegetables and big squash). Most of you looking for the smaller fridges shop more often, however, and many of you live where it's cool enough to leave the hard fruit, big squash and the roots out in baskets. I hope this gives you a good idea, however, of what might fit.

BalTra, fairly hardy produce keeps pretty well on the shelf in my fridge. Interestingly, apples and pears benefit greatly from being in the drawer, and they don't seem to make other things spoil like they're reputed to. Whereas, the tomatoes will be fine on the shelf for days if I don't move them. These are local, garden style tomatoes, not the ones that are hard and ship long distances. Washed lettuce holds well on the shelves, and so do heads of cabbage, but not so much head lettuce which is looser and has more bacteria or whatever it is that comes off when you wash it and makes it spoil faster. Berries are so-so on the shelf. Ripe melons would much rather be in the drawer. No matter what I do with turnips, they go wrinkly if they're not used right away. Rutabagas do better, in the drawer, but in the drawer or not, with or without the ethylene emitting apples and all, the turnips just don't keep well the way one expects roots to do.

Okay, but because I interwove absolute OT data into my own thread, please allow my to share my heartfelt joy and emotion at the fact that the Electricity is BACK!. Got it back at 2:48am! I almost flew outside and kissed the NSTAR guys.

Anyhow, on my little iphone I'd tried to keep up with the posts and I just wanted to say thanks for some inordinately useful info.

Plllog, you're absolutely right - this conversation rather helped me to realize that what really governs our needs - other than the quadrupeds shelf-space - is the ability to store fresh things. I don't buy copious amounts but when we do wind up buying more of the leafy stuff, the current fridge feels limiting.
So, really it is the fresh-stuff drawer that drives our requirements.

Your fresh things drawer holds a ton of stuff. You sure you didn't have to fold and iron things to get them in there?!
If I got rocket and mesclun, I wouldn't be able to get much more in one drawer. Perhaps the scallion or a zucchini or two.
And no way I'd be able to get more than two heads of kale in the second drawer - if that.
Now, I don't ever have quite that much stuff in my fridge, so I'm trying to translate that into the things that we might come back with. A bunch or even two of some sort of salad-leaves is not unnatural, to be sure.
Liek you, I also tend to use a lot of herbs - enough that they occupy non-trivial amounts of room in my fridge.

Martha, your information about the sizes and number of drawers between biofresh and non- is terribly interesting. Thank you ever so much for that. I'll have to take a look at these fridges and see what happens. Also will have to see if the 30" offers these options anyhow.

CircusPeanut, might I trouble you to ask which of these bio/non-biofresh fridges you have and if you find the drawer sizes suitable? We do seem to be of a mind in-re: grocery shopping so it would be informative to know what your fresh-stuff configuration is like given that Leibherr offers choices.

Hooray for power!!

Hm... Turns out that there were a few very small avocados hiding under the kale, in addition to what I posted above. :) Yep, the kale takes up a lot of space, but I washed it this morning and it's now air drying. What a difference! :)

I just measured the inside of the drawer: 23.5" x 17" x 6" It's not small. SxS makes for short doors (less swing space to worry about) but is otherwise limited. Just going to freezer on the bottom should help a lot. Wider is more efficient storage than narrower just because there's less unusable space on the edges, being that there are fewer edges per foot of storage. You wouldn't have to fold your greens. With a 30" wide fridge, you can put the beets in sideways and not have to fold the tops. No matter what, however, greens do take up a lot of room, and my carrots and daikon came home without them because I've been too tired to do anything with them. No folding and ironing! I promise! The kale is as curly today as it was in the store. :)

Re herbs, my attempts at growing any but rosemary haven't been very successful. Except for leafy things like basil and sorrel, I only buy small bunches. Including the pasillas, and other dried peppers, that corner of the drawer is only about 6-8 inches square.

All of which I offer up for you to have something to compare.

One thing to consider is whether you shop as frequently and "don't ever have quite that much stuff in my fridge" because you prefer to shop as you do, or if you might shop as you do because you have no hope of fitting more comfortably in your fridge.

Sounds like you are waning on the shelves idea. You're right that 6 inches or less is good for the standard paperback novels, but not for most cookbooks. It would work as a cantry -- a lot of food storage would fit there. Would that open up cookboook space somewhere else?

Either way, if it can be removed easily enough, I'd get the fridge that makes the most sense for your use and not worry about it. In five years or so, more families may be using smaller fridges. Or you might be so fond of that fridge that you would rather take it with you so you put it in the garage, basement or somewhere while you take out the shelves and install an inexpensive standard fridge that won't require any explanation or exclusions from your real estate listing. You aren't doing anything that radical or permanent, so just do what makes sense now.

plllog - that post was pure poetry!

We bought a 36" ss fridge last year. Yes, I love it, but it looks like a morgue in our kitchen! Too big. But now we are gutting the kitchen and remodeling, so it will be fine! I'd vote for the bigger fridge.

mindstorm, my Liebherr model is the simplest 30"er, the CS 1610, it does not have a special BioFresh setting nor an ice maker. Nonetheless, it is a neverending source of delight how long produce lasts in the thing - something to do with the way it has dual compressors and the moisture running on the inside rather than in back.

(Oh! And I keep forgetting to mention that if you're European, you'll appreciate that the Liebherr doors don't automatically swing closed. At least that's the case with my 2008 model; I think enough US consumers complained about "broken doors" that they may have changed their design by now. In any case there's a nice adjustable alarm that alerts you if you've left them open by mistake and the temp runs too high.)

But since I'm running nigh on 1,000 words, why not just a PICTURE. Here are my 30" fridge contents as of right this second, no photoshopping or wrinkle editing. This is where the pedal hits the metal at GardenWeb: that voyeuristic look into someone else's kitchen (and the concordant gasp of horror at how others actually live):

We've folded some of the glass shelves and taken one out, so it looks a little sparser than it has to, option-wise. But you can see last night's roast chicken and this afternoon's failed fleur-de-sel caramel (grr, the stuff won't harden, so it's caramel sauce now, I guess).

The produce drawer:

4 grapefruit, carrots, a handful of lemons and limes, some baby spinach, a romaine, a bag of mache, a bag of chard, celery, a couple of cabbages. Plus a few pounds of meat and cheeses, with room for more. That center divide is re/moveable, so you can use the whole drawer and get the full width if you do a lot of brussels sprout stalks or giganta-kale.
We've found the produce drawer perfectly adequate for our needs - if there's overflow, veggies haven't seemed to fare any worse out on the regular shelves.

The freezer:

How can you not love a fridge that tells you the correct temperature for your frozen pretzels and venison?

Bump. I think I really did silence everyone with my too-realistic photos, erk.

No you didn't! I didn't see this! thank you so much for posting and for bumping. I'd have missed it otherwise.

CP, that's perfect. I really do like the metal grates on teh door shelves, BTW. I think I'd have another shelf in there - the one you say you removed, but that otherwise looks like about the size of our needs with the exception that I'd probably need to store my repository of fresh herbs also. Else, this is about the volume of fresh ingredients that I'd want to be able to keep also. Ditto on the Gerolsteiners (love that stuff! Is perfect for a summertime fresh lemonade also ;-) ).

BTW, with the array of tasty feline/canine tins of dinner that my creatures insist that I keep at the ready, my fridge is far more unkempt than yours. There is nary a doubt in my mind that I shan't be modeling the ingredients of my fridge - it is too shabby and down-market for that.

One last Q: are there any controls for the crisper or for the vegetable drawer? I wouldn't necessarily know what to ask for if there were, but I do know that the vegetables drawer in my current fridge model is none too impressive for storing vegetables. Hence the q.

Thank you again for posting. As also for the bumping.

Delurking to come to circuspeanut's defense. :) We are 2 adults and 2 children. In our remodel (2008, 9x9 condo kitchen), we replaced a 36" standard depth fridge with a 24" Liebherr and a 12" pull-out pantry. This horrified every kitchen designer we met, but our huge fridge was usually half full while we had dry goods stacked on the counter.

Our concession to resale was to install the pantry such that it could easily be torn out and the whole thing replaced with a 36" fridge. We loved it from day one. Not only was it super functional, but it just looked so much better not to have a monster fridge dominating such a small kitchen. We have since relocated to the land of Far Away, but our renters apparently like it too.

So Mindstorm - I say get the 30" if you want!

There are no extra controls for the veggie drawer in my model, but it doesn't appear to need them. I've never had vegetables stay so fresh in a fridge. Lettuce can last days and days longer and never turns into a bag of brown slime. The fridge itself has a lot of temperature controls with features I honestly haven't ever bothered to try out.

Marthavilla can tell you more about the BioFresh system on the larger models, which seems to involve cute little drawers with different humidity levels.

By the by, what fresh food do you feed your cats? We've recently been trying a Canadian brand of frozen fresh meat which name escapes me, with only middling success - my knuckleheads pass it up for their dry food. Guess they prefer Twinkies to steak, argh.

I've never had vegetables stay so fresh in a fridge. Lettuce can last days ...
Sold. ;-)

feline foods: ah. This list could go on for days because one of my four-footed masters is super high maintenance and needs lots of variety (in ingredients as well as brand apparently). Her philosophy to what she wants from us seems to be similar to my graduate studies advisor who's favorite reprimand used to be : "I don't know what I want. I'll know it when I see it; and this ain't it."

So anyhow. We only feed our cats moist and grain-free stuff. Haven't fed them any of the dry food for now well nigh 5 years - this at the edification of another GWian who alerted me to this. So all food is either fresh home-made (and usually based on what we're making in re: fish) or tinned, grain-free.
Our shopping list of brands includes: Wellness tins (made here in Mass. actually) and Wellness pouches, Weruva (lots of vegetables in the food but fascinating chief ingredients), Spot's Stews, Dave's, Grandma's Dinners (if you please! varieties include turducken believe it or not), kiwi-something that I don't recall coz we don't have any right now ... .

Each of these brands has multiple flavours so in storage in the pantry we have multiple tins of multiple varieties of each of the above. And the reason for all that much variety is the fuss-pot I alluded to above. She tires not just of say turkey or duck or chicken or salmon, but she tires of the brand. I think coz each brand has a fairly homogeneous preparation process so just changing out the ingredients really isn't enough stimulation. I suppose as I write this that it's fair. I couldn't have quiche every day every week every month by just varying the class of quiche. So, okay, Georgia; you're forgiven (a bit).

Anyhow, the tins when opened go in the fridge. Since we give them food in multiple rounds per meal (courses), the fussy one at least insists that there be something different from course to course. So there are a minimum of 2 and oftentimes more tins than that for every meal. They don't get the entire tin in general, so there is always left over tins and flavours between meals.

Oh yes, that is aside from the really fresh stuff for them - fish parts that we just bake and give 'em as something different.

More info than you wanted to know, I'm sure. :-)