Smart Ways To Use An Over-The-Door Shoe Organizer To Keep Your Home Clutter-Free

Keeping your home clutter-free sometimes feels like a losing battle. The secret to winning the fight, especially when you have a lot of items that you use on a regular basis, is to be creative with how and where you store things. Over-the-door storage solutions are one of the best examples of how creativity can help you keep clutter at bay. They make use of the otherwise unusable space on the front or back of a door, providing you with ample space to store a variety of items. With a convenient home for these things, it will also be easier to put them back where they belong instead of piling up on tables, counters, and other surfaces.

Shoe organizers are one type of over-the-door storage you'll find. Despite their name, these can actually be used for so much more than just shoes. They offer several pockets that you can use to hold a variety of items in every room of the house. You can even find organizers with clear pockets (such as this one from Bofoho) if you want to see what's in each compartment. Narrower organizers (like this one from Simple Houseware) are also available if you have double doors for your closet or pantry. Ahead, we'll take a look at some of the smartest ways you can put these over-the-door shoe organizers to work to contain the clutter and help you achieve a neat and organized home.

Is your craft room a cluttered mess? You want your spools of ribbons, glue gun, scissors, and other materials easily accessible, but maybe they've started taking over your work area or may be lost in a messy drawer. This is one way an over-the-door shoe organizer can be a real stress-saver. Simply hang it on the back of a door in your crafting room and fill each compartment with your supplies. Everything will have its own spot, so it will be easy to find the specific items you need for a given project. Consider grouping similar items together, such as dedicating one row to your crafting tools, like your scissors, utility knife, tweezers, and hot glue gun.

If you want to stop digging in the back of a cabinet or the top of a shelf every time you need to pretreat a laundry stain, clean the bathroom, or wash the windows, pick up a new over-the-door shoe organizer. The pockets can accommodate a range of cleaning supplies including spray bottles, wipe containers, sponges, and gloves. Plus, everything will be easy to spot and grab what you need. If you have young children, you'll want to keep any chemical cleaners secure in a child-proofed cabinet. However, you could still use this hack to hold non-toxic products, brushes, microfiber towels, or dryer balls.

Pantry storage hacks can help keep your kitchen tidier and make meal prep and snack packing more efficient. So, if boxes of granola bars, applesauce pouches, fruit snacks, or chips are consuming too much space in your pantry, an over-the-door shoe organizer can come to the rescue. The pockets are the ideal size to hold smaller pantry items, freeing up shelf space for cans, pasta boxes, baking supplies, and more. You could dedicate each pocket to a certain type of item, give each family member their own section, or get ahead for the week by filling one pocket with items for each day's school lunch.

Did you know that you could also corral bathroom clutter with a shoe organizer? Free up precious countertop space by placing your personal care products in the pockets of an organizer hung on the back of the bathroom door. Consider grouping items by when they are used or even in the order in which you typically use them, and you'll find that your morning and evening routines are more streamlined. For example, the top row of the organizer could hold your face wash, toner, serum, moisturizer, and sunscreen, so you can get ready and out the door quickly.

If your child's collection of Barbies and other small dolls is getting out of control, turn to an over-the-door shoe organizer to get them off of the floor and furniture. The pockets of the organizers are large enough to hold one (or even two) dolls, which means that a 24-pocket organizer could accommodate up to 48 Barbies. Depending on the age and height of your child, you may want to place their favorite dolls in the lower pockets of the organizer so they'll be able to reach them independently. You could also save a few pockets for holding doll clothing and other small accessories to keep everything together.

Can't open your kitchen cabinets without a few water bottles or tumblers falling out and crashing to the floor? Then, you're probably looking for some genius water bottle storage hacks to declutter your cabinets. Well, look no further than that trusty over-the-door shoe organizer to help you free up space while also ensuring that everyone will be able to easily grab a bottle to meet their hydration needs. Just hang the organizer over your pantry door or another door in the kitchen, and place a water bottle in each pocket. You could sort your bottles by size or frequency of use, or even assign a row or column to each member of the household.

Finding the best way to store and organize hats is never easy. Winter hats and gloves, in particular, are bulky and often end up cluttering the floor of a closet or strewn about wherever you (or the kids) pull them off. End the chaos by storing winter gear in a shoe organizer. Each hat and pair of gloves can have their own pocket, and you can easily group items by family member so that everyone can quickly get ready to go out into the cold weather. Hang the organizer on your entryway closet door, or even consider hanging it directly on your front door during the winter months when everyone is regularly bundling up.

The uses for over-the-door shoe organizers extend outside of the home. You could also use these hanging pockets to keep tools and gardening supplies ready for use in your garage or shed. The pockets are just the right size to hold a range of tools, including hammers, screwdrivers, measuring tapes, gloves, and trowels. You might find that a shoe organizer with clear pockets will make it easier to find what you need, especially if some of your tools are shorter than the pockets.

At first thought, using a shoe organizer to store wrapping paper and other supplies together may not seem like such a great idea. After all, the pockets are nowhere near deep enough to hold a roll of wrapping paper. However, you can easily convert the organizer to hold rolls of paper and other supplies. Fortunately, the several rows and columns of pockets are placed in a neat grid. Making a slit across the bottom of several pockets (just not the one in the lowest row) will make it possible to slide a roll of paper down from the top, securing it in place with the base of the bottom pocket. Consider leaving one column of pockets uncut and using them to hold smaller wrapping supplies, such as gift tags, tape, ribbon, or bows.

Are your spices taking over your pantry or a kitchen cabinet? Do you find yourself pulling out several bottles before you finally find the one you're looking for? If so, then it might be time to consider an unexpected hack to store your spices — a shoe organizer. By hanging one on a door in the kitchen, you'll have a convenient spot to accommodate even a very large seasoning collection. Opt for one with clear or mesh pockets, and you'll be able to easily find the specific jar needed for a given recipe. Consider placing some of your most frequently used spices towards the center of the organizer, keeping them at eye level and easier to access.

Phone and tablet chargers, HDMI cables, laptop cords, and more! If you're like most people, these are just a few of the cords and cables that are cluttering your drawers and desktops. Beyond the eyesore that the clutter can create, it can also be very difficult to find the right charger or cable you need. That is unless you start using an easy hack to organize your cord and chargers on the back of a door. With a shoe organizer pocket for each cord, they won't turn into a tangled mess. Consider using a label maker, like the Phomemo D30 Portable Bluetooth Mini Label Printer, to mark each pocket, making it even easier to find the cord or cable you need (and ensuring everything gets returned where it belongs).