Inter-modal containers Ltd. is one of America’s leading manufacturers and suppliers of shipping containers, delivering them throughout the USA, individuals and to the mining, construction, agricultural and corporate sectors. We offer new, used, modified and customised shipping containers for sale in a variety of sizes and types, with fast and efficient service direct to your worksite, business or home. And with multiple depots all over Australia, we can usually have your order to you within a few days.

Our one-trip (new) 20ft Open Top (or Tin Top) shipping containers are typically used to ship or store goods that are best, or more easily, loaded through the top of the container. This option comes with a removable hard top roof but open tops do typically come with a tarpaulin cover. Most of these are also now available with a removable header bar above the cargo doors as well.

Open-top tarpaulin shipping containers are generally a more cost-effective solution to the ‘load from the top’ problem but for some customers or projects the hard top options are necessary. Note: if you do go for a tarp top we can also help supply extra large tarpaulins if your goods are too tall for the standard tarp.

All these units are original shipping containers, i.e. they are factory-made as open-top containers and they have not been converted from normal dry (or closed-top) containers. The converted units typically have much lower payloads and are not as strong or rigid as the original units.

Generally speaking, these are of interest to customers who need to export some specialist cargo. For site storage use we would most likely recommend a converted option as the payload we consider is classed safe for lifting whilst loaded. If this is going to be sat static on your site storing oversized items, then a cheaper converted unit is likely to be more cost-effective – but open tops for static storage use are rarely sought after.

Our new units are all held in our Rotterdam depot, we typically have smaller numbers in stock ready to go at 24 hours’ notice and can have them moved into most of our US depots very quickly.

We have previously had a few in some US locations but it is very much on an ‘as and when basis’ so it’s always worth contacting us to check stock levels. We can of course move units to any of our US depots at reasonably short notice. For this reason, local prices and availability will vary.

Please be advised that these are sold as ‘one trip containers’ and are not brand new. All of our shipping containers are built in a factory in China or the Far East and have done 1 trip into the USA since new. Some minor cosmetic wear may be evident from this initial trip. Minor dents and scrapes are reasonably common, as are tire marks inside your container where a forklift truck or similar may have unloaded goods from inside the container.

All of our containers are checked over in our USA depots before sale and are sold with our wind and watertight guarantees. You can read more on what wear we consider acceptable in our recent article What to expect from a one-trip shipping container.

Buy a 20ft open-top container