A large DVD collection can be hard to organize. In my home there are over 1,000 DVDs. A large DVD collection like this can quickly become a nightmare. There were times when we would search for 10 to 15 minutes for a movie we wanted to watch. This is when we knew we had to come up with a way to organize our large DVD collection. If you have a large DVD collection, you may also experience times when you’d love to just grab a movie and watch it, but finding it is almost impossible. In this article, I’ll discuss the solutions we have came up with to organize our large DVD collection.
The first step you need to follow, to organize a large DVD collection, is to buy proper shelving. When you have a large DVD collection, shelves that are made for DVDs are a must. If you try to use deep shelving so that you can have more than one row of movies on each shelf, you will have a much harder time finding the movie you want to watch. Now, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that you don’t want to invest in an expensive shelving system. That’s fine. The DVD towers that we use cost $20 at your local Family Dollar and are made by Sauder. These each hold 75 DVDs. We have them lined around the walls of our living room and they actually look quite nice. You can also buy shelving that is wider, but the towers fit easily into small spaces, which means you can fit several shelves along your wall.
Once you have shelving, you will need to think about how you want to organize your large DVD collection on the shelves. There are several different options you can choose from:
Alphabetical Order: Many people choose to organize their large DVD collection by alphabetical order. This does make it really easy to find a movie when you want it, but there is a problem with this option. When you have a large DVD collection that is in alphabetical order, you will need to shift your movies every time you buy a new movie. This can be a real pain.
By Genre: Another way to organize a large DVD collection is to place the movies in order by the genre of the movie. For example, you could have horror followed by romantic comedy. This can still cause a problem with having to shift your movies over each time you buy a new one. But, if you have a lot of one genre, you could devote an entire tower to that genre.
The Shelf System: This is the way we have decided to organize our large DVD collection. Instead of worrying about shifting movies every time we buy a new movie, we simply organize our large DVD collection by the shelf the movie is on. Once you have filled your towers up, label each tower with a letter, and then each shelf with a number. Then go back and write down the movies that are on each shelf of each tower. The next time you want to watch a movie, you’ll simply look at the list and be able to quickly find the movie you want to watch.
