Who can’t use a helpful organizing tip now and then?
Today’s ‘Helpful Organizing Tip” has to do with how to organize your shoes. I’ve worked with clients who own over a hundred pair of shoes. It can easily happen if you live in the Northeast where the temperatures can vary from zero degrees to over a hundred degrees. With those climate extremes, men and women need everything from flip flops to snow boots and everything in between. Then there are people who do not live in a climate that requires many pair of footwear–they just love shoes!
The first time I worked with a client with a large amount of shoes I learned a valuable lesson I’d like to share with you…
The Helpful Organizing Tip for today is:
Don’t organize your shoes on the floor. Use your bed instead.
Why? I’ll explain it to you in one word: HEADACHE. Not the ‘pain-in-the-neck’ kind of headache that requires two Tylenol but the real ‘pounding-above-your-eyes-I-have-to-lie-down-now’ headache. Continuously bending over to the floor to sort, examine, and pick up tens of pairs of shoes can cause a physical headache.
We don’t want that! We want to get organized and be headache-free! Read on…
Instead, try this solution: Drape an old flat sheet over your bed and place the pairs of shoes for sorting on top of it. No bending and no headache. Too many shoes to fit on your bed at once? Break down the task. Start with your summer footwear and when you’ve finished sorting and purging them, take the ‘keepers’ off the bed and repeat with your fall/winter shoes.
Need a visual? Check out my YouTube video below…
Share this tip and video with a shoe-lovin’ friend!
So important to bring sorting up to at least waist level. The bed is much better than the floor, and a nice large surface:) I was just sorting shoes with a client the other day and she was squatting down. I suggested we move the shoes up for sorting, as squatting gets old quickly. I always have a tarp in my “bag of tricks” which has a designated clean side and dirty side for jobs like this!
Happy to hear you did not require two Tylenol after your shoe organizing experience. And I’m sure your client was grateful for your knowledge and preparedness. A tarp in your ‘bag of tricks’ is a great idea! Thanks for sharing.
Very clever, Stacey! You make such an excellent point about the importance of bringing comfort (physical and emotional) to the organizing process. The more we can do,to make organizing a positive experience for our clients, the better chance of them sustaining long-term success. And as organizers, it’s also important to be aware of our bodies and not putting undue strain on them. Thanks for the tip and the reminder.
Everything we do as Professional Organizers is supposed to make our client’s lives easier! If we can offer them ways to ‘get the job done’ as painlessly as possible then you’re right–they have a better chance of sustaining long-term success. I wouldn’t want to make shoe organizing a real headache! 🙂
I agree with you — the bed is the best place to sort almost anything. Fortunatley, I don’t have too many shoes so I can sort all in one sitting! =) And, sometimes I select a pair and drop them in the donate bag I keep in my closet.
Having a donate bag in the closet is the key to an easy purge for us and our clients. I’ve worked with clients with over 100 pair of shoes–sometimes the bed isn’t even big enough! But using the bed as a staging area for sorting footwear makes the task less of a ‘headache’ than it could be.
A blog by Professional Organizer Stacey Agin Murray bursting with cool products, 'gotta-tell-a-friend' ideas, and a whole lotta organizing know-how. Learn more...
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About Stacey
When you grow up in a 5’x12′ bedroom, you learn to organize pretty quickly! I chose to take that knowledge and turn it into a business helping people find what they need when they need it. I’m also the author of The Organized Bride’s Thank You Note Handbook–a book that offers wedding thank you note-related organizing tips and how-to’s plus 101 unique sample thank you notes (what bride can’t use that?).
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So important to bring sorting up to at least waist level. The bed is much better than the floor, and a nice large surface:) I was just sorting shoes with a client the other day and she was squatting down. I suggested we move the shoes up for sorting, as squatting gets old quickly. I always have a tarp in my “bag of tricks” which has a designated clean side and dirty side for jobs like this!
Happy to hear you did not require two Tylenol after your shoe organizing experience. And I’m sure your client was grateful for your knowledge and preparedness. A tarp in your ‘bag of tricks’ is a great idea! Thanks for sharing.
Very clever, Stacey! You make such an excellent point about the importance of bringing comfort (physical and emotional) to the organizing process. The more we can do,to make organizing a positive experience for our clients, the better chance of them sustaining long-term success. And as organizers, it’s also important to be aware of our bodies and not putting undue strain on them. Thanks for the tip and the reminder.
Everything we do as Professional Organizers is supposed to make our client’s lives easier! If we can offer them ways to ‘get the job done’ as painlessly as possible then you’re right–they have a better chance of sustaining long-term success. I wouldn’t want to make shoe organizing a real headache! 🙂
I agree with you — the bed is the best place to sort almost anything. Fortunatley, I don’t have too many shoes so I can sort all in one sitting! =) And, sometimes I select a pair and drop them in the donate bag I keep in my closet.
Having a donate bag in the closet is the key to an easy purge for us and our clients. I’ve worked with clients with over 100 pair of shoes–sometimes the bed isn’t even big enough! But using the bed as a staging area for sorting footwear makes the task less of a ‘headache’ than it could be.