What to do with food storage when moving

 

Here is an email I received:

 

Hi Amy,

I hear you're the guru of food storage.  We're having movers for the first time and there's a possibility we'll have them store our stuff for the month of July.  I'm sure they won't put it in a climate controlled area, so I'm worried about the heat' s impact on our food storage shelf life.  It's all the basic cannery stuff, maybe a couple cans of freeze dried fruits and veg, sugar, but mostly beans and quite a bit of wheat.  I do rotate some of it, but dry beans are a pain and I just don't anticipate getting through all of them before we're closer to 15-20 years in the can.  This was a wedding present from my parents, gleaned from their storage, so it was already 5 or so years old and in 7 years I've used about a year's worth of the original cans of wheat, rice, etc, but I've hardly touched the beans.

I just feel like there's potentially a big difference between a couple days in a UHaul when we moved to NC versus a month who knows where, so I'm wondering if I should try to sell it for less than the cannery charges and then add some savings and buy new when we get settled in our new state.  That would also let me improve the ratio of our storage to align better with what we actually use, though of course we'll still store a good amount of beans for protein completion.

Any thoughts or advice is appreciated!

 Dear friend:

I really don't have a good answer for you.  It is true that a month in a hot storage unit in July is going to damage your storage.  You will have to decide if you want to sell it.  I assume that people who buy it are going to want a super good deal or no one is going to bother buying it.  You might have to give it away.

 You will have to weigh these questions:  Is it worth it to you to pay to move it across the country with it already going down in nutritional value?  Can you stand to sell it for very little (or give it away)?  Do you want to buy all new, or do you have the money to buy all new?  If you get rid of it, would you procrastinate buying new, and therefore not have any food storage for awhile?  Would it be better to keep this already-paid-for food, even if it has lower nutritional value, instead of having none?  It all depends on how soon you think a personal disaster or national disaster is going to happen. 

That is all the advice I can think of.  Best wishes with your decision.