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[urnmor]

I am looking to purchase a small freezer to sock some frozen foods.  It will be mostly my wife and me however our son may also use it as he lives close by.  I was looking at the Midea 5 cu ft or the NewAir 6.7 with digital controls.  They both open from the top, however the NewAir is significantly more expensive. 
Thanks in advance.

[hughver]

I have two 5cu' freezers, one on the boat and one here at home. One from Costco and one from Best Buy. both work great, have been reliable and cost less than $300 . they both keep food at -5° or lower. The one here is a Frigidaire.

[Bar-B-Lew]

I would highly recommend getting a stand up freezer with shelves in it.

[Hank D Thoreau]

One thing about freezers is that you will always manage to overfill them, no matter what size you buy.

I got a 10.6 cu foot freezer, and it is packed to the gills.

Also Bar-B-Lew makes a good point about an upright. A big issue we have is that it is difficult to get to the stuff that is not on top.

It is hard to keep track of what you have when it is buried in the freezer.

We have had to cull out stuff that aged out on us because we forgot we had it.

There was a big shortage of freezers when we got ours last year. We had to wait a few months, and many we looked at were going to take a large part of a year to deliver.

I am not sure what the situation is like now with the supply chain issues.

[reubenray]

The last two comments are exactly the reason I went from a 7.1cf chest freezer to a 17.9cf upright freezer.  With the chest freezer I would have to dig stuff out and lay on the floor while digging for what I wanted.  It never fails that the item I want is in the bottom no matter how I try to keep it organized.

[BigDave83]

I have a 14 cf upright, and a 5 cf chest. Not really sure of the brands, I buy from a small local place it is the only place my parent ever bought appliances and I have just continued to go there.

Growing up we only had chest freezers.

I can tell you that no matter which style you get, you will put more in it than you should and nothing will be manageable. I bought plastic boxes at the dollar store for in the upright, it does make it easier to clean and defrost. But the chest freezer everything is at the bottom and you have no idea what is in there, with the upright everything is at the back and you have no idea what is in there.

If you vac seal a lot of stuff for storing, buy the chest, those bags do not do well stacking in the upright they slide around. I have had a couple times where I left someone put stuff in the upright that we sealed, and I walk out if I am lucky a few hours later and the door is open slightly. One or so of the bags slid and hit the door just right to pop it open some. that doesn't happen in a chest freezer.

No matter what, things hardly ever get rotated, we date and name stuff we seal up, and it never fails when we clean it out once a year there is all of the newly dated stuff in the front and the old dates in the back. I am not sure how to combat that, other than not putting to much in it.

[Canadian John]

 Another aspect is: Efficiency... Chest freezers win hands down when it comes to energy efficiency.

[reubenray]

I have a 14 cf upright, and a 5 cf chest. Not really sure of the brands, I buy from a small local place it is the only place my parent ever bought appliances and I have just continued to go there.

Growing up we only had chest freezers.

I can tell you that no matter which style you get, you will put more in it than you should and nothing will be manageable. I bought plastic boxes at the dollar store for in the upright, it does make it easier to clean and defrost. But the chest freezer everything is at the bottom and you have no idea what is in there, with the upright everything is at the back and you have no idea what is in there.

If you vac seal a lot of stuff for storing, buy the chest, those bags do not do well stacking in the upright they slide around. I have had a couple times where I left someone put stuff in the upright that we sealed, and I walk out if I am lucky a few hours later and the door is open slightly. One or so of the bags slid and hit the door just right to pop it open some. that doesn't happen in a chest freezer.

No matter what, things hardly ever get rotated, we date and name stuff we seal up, and it never fails when we clean it out once a year there is all of the newly dated stuff in the front and the old dates in the back. I am not sure how to combat that, other than not putting to much in it.

I had first hand experience with the sliding sealed packages of meat this morning when transferring the meat from the chest to the upright freezer.  I pulled the extra baskets I had in the chest freezer and filled them up.  This made a lot more space than just laying it on the shelves.  Right now I have my beef on one shelf, pork on one shelf and misc. items on the other shelves.  Each shelf is about half full.

[hughver]

I would highly recommend getting a stand up freezer with shelves in it.

I agree. The only time that get to the bottom of the chest freezer is when I defrost.

[BigDave83]

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[/quote]

I had first hand experience with the sliding sealed packages of meat this morning when transferring the meat from the chest to the upright freezer.  I pulled the extra baskets I had in the chest freezer and filled them up.  This made a lot more space than just laying it on the shelves.  Right now I have my beef on one shelf, pork on one shelf and misc. items on the other shelves.  Each shelf is about half full.
[/quote]

That is how I have my upright set up, I have plastic bins different shelf for different meat. It works great in my head but as it gets fuller and the GF puts things away, she says there is an empty spot and then it is all out of wack.

[Darwin]

Upright freezer makes it easier to things.  Out of site, out of mind.

[urnmor]

My thanks to all .  After careful consideration I went with a Midea 5 cu ft freezer chest.  Primaraily because of the price.  It was on sale and I had a 20 dollar coupon so it only cost 129 dollars with free shipping from the Exchange.  I looked at another other web site and a different brand that cost 260 however they wanted 220 dollars for shipping.  I thought that was crazy. 

[Chris__M]

When I got my chest freezer for the garage (in addition to the upright freezer part of my kitchen fridge/freezer) I immediately had some custom baskets made. They weren't expensive (about 20 quid per item, for 5 items), and are made to stack in two layers. Which means I only have to lift one or two baskets to get at anything, and if I am organised about what goes where, things are easy to find.

The company that makes them manufacturs to order, and also makes dog crates!

Note: UK company, so no use to you guys, although I'm sure there are companies your way doing the same.

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In addition to those, the freezer actually came with 3 hanging basket trays.

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[Chris__M]

I actually want to get a second smaller freezer out there (same make, Beko), to split raw food storage + dog food and "ready to heat" meals and items, either home-cooked or shop bought. Not for contamination reasons, but just convenience.

[reubenray]

In my chest freezer I had two baskets in the bottom and three hanging baskets.  In order to get to the bottom baskets most of everything had to come out.  It was a 7cf model where my new upright is a 17.9cf.  I have a lot of space now and I am using the baskets from the chest freezer.  I am keeping the chest freezer for now to see if I need it after buying some beef/pork from a local rancher.