Welcome to the dark side, MrsPete lol! I am an elfan since the 80s and can testify that the stuff is unnaturally strong. I haven't used it in a pantry, but the abuse I've heaped on it in closets, laundry rooms, craft rooms, storerooms, basements, and garages, must rival any pickle jar, or dozens of pickle jars, you could place on it.

The elfa door-mount system I have not had experience with. But there is an old one on my louvered (solid wood, but louvered) pantry door in this house, and I have no qualms about putting jars and cans on it.

Btw, one of my drawer frames was damaged in a move, probably its 3rd moving van experience, and when I brought it in for a replacement piece they gave me the part, no charge.

The January 30% sale starts after Christmas and has been going into February. Design it all beforehand, and buy it then. They also have a 25% sale on shelving in August, don't they? And it includes elfa shelving, but not the drawers.

@bpathome - we are building a house and I had planned to hit up the elfa January sale for all our closets. You call out designing it beforehand .... I hadn't thought about this approach. Do you recommend this because it takes so much back and fourth to design? Or because they are super busy? Either way - thanks for the tip!

I have had Elba in my pantry for about three years. Best decision ever!

Michelle, will you show a picture? If anyone has this in their closets, will you please share a picture. No cleaning up before hand. I want to see real life. :)

foolnt8, I don't know about your Container Store, but mine is crazy busy during the sale. You sign in, get a beeper like at Panera Bread, and wait, as long as 45 minutes (though if you go at the right time, you skip the beeper and wait) for a designer. And though they are quick with the design, it does take a little time: they need your space dimensions, put them in the design program, ask you about your needs, and go to town. If you have any specific ideas, you need to let them know. While they can come up with creative ideas, during the sale they start with basic formulas. So, if you go before the sale you can spend more time with your designer, mull it over and tweak if you want, and get the closet you need. Then during the sale, you submit your order and get the great deals.

Gwlake, i will think about taking a picture without cleaning up. But be forewarned: I remember reading an interview with the founder many years ago at his home: Tidiness is a state of mind, the Container Store just sells tools. You still have to use them lol!

I have it in our small pantry area and also my closet. Love it's. Here's a quick photo. The small rack is on the wall, not a door system. We used to have a microwave on one of the shelves. Our door is a curtain. And I have better things to do than keep it organized. :)

Lowe's sells a similar organizer system for less. Both systems derive their strength by hanging the rails from a hanger unit that is screwed into the header along the top of the wall. I have some Elfa towers and some of the Lowe's clothing hangers in the same closet. While, they are different systems and are not interchangeable, they do look good together. I like the Lowe's system as much as the Elfa system.

For pantries I used the stainless rolling stainless racks on wheels. We use these in our garage, too. They do come in different sizes. The advantage is I can roll these out to clean and to access the freezer for maintenance without unpacking everything.

We used Elfa in our last house, which had a small, shallow closet for a pantry. It worked great! We also used the door-mounted shelves, and they held a lot of weight. I didn't hesitate to put cans, bottles, or jars on them.

We have Elfa in most all our closets. Weight is not an issue. Here's our untidy pantry.

You can also do wood shelves. And you can get liners for the wire shelves if you have things that might slip through. They also have drawers that attach to the brackets, so you could have a shallow drawer for napkins or placemats at a convenient height.

Okay, 100% positive reviews here. Can't beat that.

I didn't know I was becoming an Elfan.

I must investigate the Lowes options, the freestanding options, etc.

One question: In their catalog and online, Elfa seems to use almost exclusively the drawers-attached-to-the-walls ... but I see that the sit-on-the-floor Drawer Runner system (did I get that name right?) that Quadesi uses just above is considerably cheaper. Are they pushing the more expensive item because of profit, or does is have some benefit I can't see? I'm thinking that the sit-on-the-floor Drawers Runners would be best for a pantry, especially because they could be on wheels and could be pulled out for cleaning.

Thanks for your feedback, especially on designing-first, returning-to-buy during the sale. The Container Store is more than an hour from my house, but 30% off is worth the effort.

On the bottom shelf of the pictured pantry is one of those attached slide out baskets.

FWIW, I have the Metro shelving pictured by Home Chef . I'm not here to tout the shelving, but I am here to say I didn't like any wire shelving (including the kind I had in my last house's laundry) until I put the liners on them - not really to keep things from falling through, rather to make it easier to slide things around.

I had Elfa in my closet and was just so so about it. It was very expensive and I ended up ripping them out to put in something else.

I also got Closetmaid from HD or Lowes and used that in my back office for storage. That was much cheaper. I was happy with them and the weight they carried.

Re: which kind of drawers, they each have their benefits. Having the little frames that you can pull out is useful for cleaning, or if you store something in the corner behind it you can pull it out to access it.There are even hooks and baskets that can hang off the sides for bottles or whatever.

There are two kinds of the other drawers that you integrate into the system. I might prefer to keep my daily napkins and placemats higher to keep them away from the cat hair dust bunnies. Quadesi's drawer is the perfect dimensions for packets and such, as shown, and you can reach in without pulling it out. The integrated drawers make it easy to keep bags of chocolate chips, nuts, coconut, etc, near your boxed and canistered baking supplies. Yes, you could just use baskets or FridgeBinz instead, which are more easily moved when you want to rearrange your pantry, and cheaper besides.

I have an x-narrow unit that sits next to a counter in my kitchen. Originally it went next to a range that had NO counterspace around it, and only 11" available if we slid the range all the way against the fridge. Even an 11" butcher block top was heaven in that woeful kitchen. Now it holds towels, napkins, straws, potatoes, and onions, as well as oven pads and water bottles from hooks on the side and thermal coffee mugs in a basket on the side. The Foreman grill sits on top.

The pantry can have wood shelving if you want.

A friend, who works for Container Store, first told me about the Elfa system about a decade ago. DH and I took the plunge during their Jan sale, converting the fixed, painted MDF shelving in 3 bedroom closets to Elfa. We were amazed at how much more storage we gained in each closet.

We replaced the pantry shelving - also fixed, painted MDF - with Elfa the following January, boosting the storage capacity by at least 50%.

Here's my pantry:

If not for how much my modestly sized pantry holds - and I have room to spare - I would not have been able to eliminate upper cabs on one wall when we remodeled our kitchen (reveal to come soon).

It's not the least expensive system out there but IMO, it offers a lot of bang for the buck. And I love how flexible it is! I have absolutely no regrets about spending the money on Elfa systems.

As for how much weight they can bear: one of the salespeople we worked with way back when sat on the shelves in the store. He was 6'1", 180 lbs (he told us). No problem, whatsoever.

Another Elfan here. If the doors are solid, I don't think any food item(s) would be too heavy. We have them on a little odd wall in the pantry, the pantry door back, and various closet doors. Really helps organize, super sturdy, and easy on the eyes.

I wish I could switch the custom melamine shelving in our pantry closet for Elfa, but I think DH would majorly balk at that (more important things needing our $ at the moment!). I absolutely LOVE my Elfa outfitted walk-in bedroom closet!!!!

Elfa also has a free-standing option. We have an ancient house without enough closet space and plaster walls. I made a small bedroom into a dressing room. Love it! Best of all, now that we are preparing to move I don't have to patch walls in order to avoid losing a bedroom! And I can use the Elfa in the next house which has California Closets that aren't arranged optimally for us. Add me to the list of Elfans.

We have Elfa in our master bedroom closets, as well as 4 other closets. We also have an entire wall of Elfa for bookshelves, and in a storage room. We use the drawer system on the floor in the MBR closets. They are great. Elfa is expensive, but the 30% off sale every year helps. It is not only strong enough to hold a lot of cans, it will probably hold you as well. The great thing about it (in addition to quality and strength) is how easy it is to reconfigure. We redid one of the MBR closets recently and it was simple. We plan to do our garage during the next sale. We tried the shelf systems from Home Depot and Lowes, but the quality just doesn't compare.

thanks for the photos,all. Just wondering about those who installed it on the back of a pantry door.....do you feel that was okay. Does the cumbersome nature of it, or the weight, or the movement of items when opening/closing the door bother anyone at all? I think about loading up the door like that and something along these issues holds me back. But this pantry holds a lot of other things so I'm in and out many times in a day-maybe the loaded door wouldn't be so good. Just wondering.

The door rail had many holes to secure it with a screw to the door or wall. The racks sit solidly on the rail. It is really a great system. Nothing jiggles when I open and close the door - which is often.

herbflavor, ours is not permanently attached to the door. It hooks on at the top and bottom and then tightened in place to stay secure.

We were limited to the narrower baskets because our door is narrow but they still hold quite a bit. We load it up with drinks. It wobbles slightly when we open or close the door but it doesn't affect door function.

Everything Elfa is presently 25% off. I didn't note the sale's last day before I recycled the catalog, but here is a link:

http://www.containerstore.com/campaign/shelving-sale

We've got elfa in our pantry - and our bedroom closet. Never had an issue with weight - this was probably already said, but the rail at the top and the long strips for attaching shelf holders distributes the weight against the entire wall. If I think about the clothing hanging from my closet rails - I'm certain that's a lot more weight than food in my pantry.

I've loved seeing pictures from other GW elfa pantry layout. Our pantry is about to get larger and I love the additional ideas for placement of shelves. For the increased size, I'll add some elfa solid shelves and I plan to use the pantry for storing various items that no longer have a home in a cupboard (e.g., vases, extra wine glasses) and I think I'll prefer a solid shelf for some of those items.

I just installed the elfa pantry door rack (direct to my hollow core door). I'm using it for spices since I have so many of the huge Costco size containers. It was easy to install and seems sturdy. I don't know that I'd load it up with heavy liquid filled jars, but is seems fine for spices. I still need to add a few more baskets to it, my store was sold out of the medium size which is the one that holds the larger spice containers