15 Sports Equipment Storage Ideas for Active Families

Perhaps the most important out of all sports mom tips is advice on how to store all that equipment. I mean, it spills out everywhere, right? You trip over cleats in the mudroom, some gloves are in the garage while others are in the kids’ rooms… so unorganized. But with these sports equipment storage ideas, you’ll know just where everything is so you can focus on other things… like winning as a sports mom and trying to be on time for all those practices and games!

Best Ways to Store Sports Equipment

I was bringing up laundry from the basement when I tripped and fell over a tennis ball, that was the lst straw and I needed to find clever ways to organize and store all the sporting equipment in the house as throwing them out was out of the question. I did some research and I found storage tips for,

Balls of all shapes and sizes
Football helmets
Gloves and mittens
Skate shoes and ski poles

I have compiled what I found and made a list just for you,

1. Use a Large Laundry Basket

This may seem pretty obvious, but getting a large laundry basket and throwing all the sports gear in is a simple and clean way to make sure they don’t spill out of the closet and into your peace of mind.

If you keep your kids’ sports equipment in a closet, a large laundry basket is a great way to wrangle all those balls and racquets. What I liked most about this idea was the simple elegance of it, laundry baskets are cheap and they can accommodate a lot of sports equipment.

2. DIY Storage for Small-Sized Sports Equipment

Use pieces of gutter troughs to make little shelves in which small items can fit. Most of the work for the shelving has already been done for you by the manufacturer. You only need to cut the gutter into required length, cap off the sides, and mount your new DIY shelf

Here’s another example of the ball corral with gutter troughs attached to the side for small ball and mitt storage.

3. Pegboard For Garage Storage

Pegboards are a genius way to organize your storage for anything, including sports equipment. Buy a board and dedicate it to sports equipment. The sports equipment will look like trophies hanging in your garage. Make sure to get some strong hooks for the pegboard on which everything will hang. You can even mount some baskets or brackets to hang anything, from your bike to that pail of tennis balls.

For garage storage, a pegboard is a genius idea! Add hooks for helmets, baskets for smaller balls, and a pallet bat stand for those baseball bats.

3. Mesh Laundry Bag

Mesh laundry bags come in handy when you want to hang up small items that can fit in. They are cheap and easy to get not to mention quite neat to use. Here’s another example of pegboard storage in the garage, but the balls are stored in a mesh laundry bag. Not a bad idea!

4. Pails For Balls

Put your balls in a pail and hang it up on your pegboard or stick the pail in a corner away from human traffic. You will always know where all your balls are and you won’t have to worry about tripping over them as you go about your business in the garage.

Attach pails to the pegboard to hold small balls like tennis balls and baseballs.

Also read: 16 Ways to Organize with Pegboards

5. Bungee Cords To Secure Balls to The Wall

Let’s be honest, footballs, basketballs, volleyballs, beachballs are too big to fit in a pail or laundry basket. You can maybe fit one or two in, but what to do with the rest? If you have some strong flexible rope, say bungee chords lying around, you can put them to good use by making this DIY storage idea for large balls

Make use of some studs to create a flexible storage area for sports balls. Add a u-shape to connect the studs together at the top and bottom, drill some holes, and then string 3-foot bungee cords to keep everything inside.

7. DIY Rolling Storage Cart For Sports Equipment Storage

Who doesn’t like the idea of a rolling cart you can move around the house when you need to reorganize things without calling for help to drag it over? If you fancy yourself a carpenter, I have just the hack for you, that you can use to make a cart as big as you need to store all your sportswear. What’s more, you can customize sections of the cart for different types or sizes of gear.

If you’re not afraid to tackle a DIY project, a rolling storage cart provides ample storage for absolutely everything in your sports arsenal.

8. Garage Cubbies

I recently bought a new bookshelf for the house after the old one got too big for a house that was getting increasingly smaller with each addition of new stuff. The old one was still in relatively good condition and just needed a few repairs and a touch of paint and so I could not just throw it out.

At first, I put the old bookshelf in the garage as I brainstormed on what to do with it, but then those cubbies started filling up with stuff, especially sports equipment that I keep in the garage. This was my lightbulb moment, I would spruce up the bookshelf and make it into a proper storage facility for the family’s assorted sportswear in the garage.

Repurpose an old bookshelf or build your own garage cubbies. Love that it provides storage for shoes, helmets, and other smaller pieces of equipment.

10. Hang Ski Poles and Ice Skates

Skiing equipment is a pain to store for the summer. These long poles and shoes do not fit into anything and cannot be left to lean against a wall throughout summer, someone is bound to trip over them and disorganize the entire setup. You need to find a quiet place in the corner of your garage and hang up the equipment until the next winter when it can be brought out again.

Use rubber-coated hooks and ladder hooks to hang ski poles and ice skates when they’re not in use.

11. DIY PVC Football Equipment Storage

I love playing with plumbing equipment. I just love how the pipes fit into each other and this idea I saw online has me intrigued.

It seems the creator joined PVC pipes to make a cage in which he fit in crates where he stores his football equipment. He also made a stand for the t-shirt and helmet.

For a cheap solution, try this PVC football equipment storage idea. (Unsure of original source – If it’s yours, let us know so we can credit you!

12. PVC Ball Rack

Another genius idea to organize with PVC Pipes Projects, only this time, the creator designed a rack to hold his footballs, netballs, basketballs, and volleyballs. I like this idea since you can make your rack as big or as small as you require depending on the number and sizes of balls you need to rack up.

A PVC ball rack is another affordable project you’ll want to tackle to corral all those balls.

13. Sweater Hanger

A sweater hanger makes for great helmet storage, don’t you think? What’s more, one hanger can take up to 3 helmets and go into your closet or on the pegboard we made earlier. You can have all your family’s helmets in the same corner of your garage assigned to football and never have to worry about tripping on them again.

14. Wire Basket for Outdoor Storage

You lack a garage, or maybe you simply don’t have space for your sports equipment inside the house. Worry not, take some appropriately sized baskets and hung them on your outer walls somewhere away from direct sunlight or itchy fingers.

I would recommend this hack for the equipment you use quite often. The equipment that you rarely use may not be able to stand the weather outside for long stretches of time waiting for you to use them, sinf indoor storage for those.

Attach baskets to the back of the shed door for balls and gloves. What a great idea for those who don’t have a garage! Want the kids to confine their equipment to their bedrooms? A wire basket holds a lot, and it provides some decor for the room, too.

15. Chalkboard Schedule

And a bonus tip for keeping parents organized: Put a chalkboard schedule near your sports equipment storage area to keep track of the kids’ games and practices. The schedule will help you know which sports equipment to bring out of hiding or which are nowhere near use and need to go to the attic to clear up space.