Do you have newly hatched chicks for sale and need a cute way to help customers transport them home that doesn’t cost a fortune? Here is how to turn inexpensive gabled treat boxes into custom chick carriers that buyers will love!
Custom Chick Carriers: An Idea Was Born
I don’t know if you have ever priced them but printed pet bird transport boxes are astronomically expensive. Yet they are convenient and really do give your farm business a professional look. Chick buyers often show up excited and unprepared, having not thought about how they are going to carry their chicks home. If you have wished to remedy this problem and do so in style, I have come up with a way to make beautiful custom chick carriers!
Custom Chick Carriers
I stumbled across jumbo sized gabled treat boxes online one day and noticed how remarkably similar they were to disposable pet bird carriers. The only thing missing were air holes but I already owned a perfect sized paper punch. I ordered a couple packs of different sized treat boxes to experiment with and discovered they worked! Not only that but they looked darling with my homestead stamp on the front.
Adding Airflow
Newly hatched chicks like to be kept warm so you don’t need holes the entire length of the box. One small hole on the top of each side is plenty to allow fresh air in. I use a ½ inch circle punch high on the carton to ensure no one sticks their head through and gets themselves stuck. Your chick carrier is now ready!
Size Matters
The first treat boxes I ordered were the standard 6.2 x 3.5 x 3.5 inches typically used for party favor boxes. They are cute but they only hold 3 standard breed baby chicks for a very short drive home. The larger 8 x 4.75 x 5.25 inch treat boxes are a much better option, comfortably holding 10 two-day-old chicks or 8 one-week-old chicks.
Filler Materials
In the bottom of each tote you should add a generous handful of pine shavings or straw to cushion the chicks and provide litter to absorb droppings on their journey home. The totes are rated to hold about 2 pounds and can easily handle the weight of lightweight bedding and chicks.
What Size Stamp?
Love the idea of using your egg carton stamps on the side of the chick carriers? Me, too! For the small 6.2 x 3.5 x 3.5 inch carriers, a 4×2 inch stamp is perfect – the same size we use to stamp our half dozen split cartons. For the larger 8 x 4.75 x 5.25 inch treat totes, our 6×2 inch stamps look fantastic!
Putting It All Together
I like to stamp each treat tote while it is laying flat, let air dry then add a single hole near the top of each gable. The boxes can then be stored flat or left standing open, ready to be filled with straw and chicks. They are quick and easy to close, which is nice because chicks can be remarkably swift to leap from a box! Once complete, you have very appealing custom chick carriers that you can be proud to hand over to buyers.
Supplies Used:
These are Amazon affiliate links.
EK Tools 1/2 inch circle punch
Silver Homestead Custom Designed Stamps from Etsy
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Do you happen to have a chick tracking sheet. I saw the incubator sheet and hatching eggs, but wasn’t sure how to search for possibly a chick tracking sheet that weren’t hatched on the farm!
I do have a couple chick tracking sheets I made for myself! I bet my readers would love to have them, too. Here are links to both:
https://silverhomestead.com/chick-tracking-sheets
https://silverhomestead.com/chick-hatching-record
Hello,
I am in love with your Bright Layer Easter Eggers! I live about 90 minutes away from Houston and would love to add some of these to our flock. How do I go about ordering? Thank you.
Thank you so much for all your wonderful ideas and super easy to understand articles! Any time I google anything chicken related, your articles come up and they are PERFECT for what I was needing at the time❤️ When I’m ready to purchase my carton stamps, it’ll be from you!
is there a source in central Arkansas to purchase the 10 chick boxes in bulk. or do you sell them.
Hi George!
Uline.com is the only place I know of that sells the gabled treat boxes in bulk cases of 100 each. Luckily the kraft color are the least expensive!
Check them out here: https://www.uline.com/BL_5618/Gable-Boxes