Product Review: The Organized Barn and Trailer HOSS System

When I got the 1 horse slant with it's smaller dressing room, I knew I would have to get smart about organization.  I've noticed that my stress level about showing goes way down when I'm organized, so I put a lot of effort into making sure things are easily accessible.

I've always liked the idea of The Organized Barn and Trailer's HOSS system, but was intimidated by the idea of hanging things in metal studs.  I tried once to drill into the steel studs in the KB and I failed.

Ended up using industrial strength Velcro instead, which worked fine, but had a 10lb max limit. 
Wanted to make a post about this and didn't, oh well.

I was determined to mount things on the wall in the Shadow.  Luckily, aluminum is much easier to drill into than steel.  This is what it looked like when I got it:

This is what it looks like now:

I did some price comparisons with other non-horse specific gridwall kits, and honestly, TOBT was competitive on price.  They are also a really friendly small horsey business willing to go the extra mile to help you out, and I always like to vote with my dollar to support places like that.  I started with their Trailer Dressing Room Kit.

Mounting it was so much easier than I thought it would be; I'll do a separate how-to in another post.

Halfway done mounting the first gridwall.

Once I had the first kit installed and I saw what more I still needed to get off the ground, I placed a second order, this time for piecemeal parts instead of a kit.  The day after I placed this order, I got this email from Sue at The Organized Barn:

How awesome is that?  They totally could've pocketed that $62 and I wouldn't have known, but instead they refunded it back to my card.  AMAZING customer service!

I used a 1x4 gridwall and a double hook to hang my folding muck cart above the spare tire on one front wall (I had a tub, but it takes up too much room in the new dressing room, so it had to go).

I used the other 1x4 to mount my fan and a couple of other things:

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Never been one to spend money on something like a fan holder when bungee cords and twine works just fine at shows, but I wanted to be able to mount it for storage here, and this was the most secure option.

The new 3x4 gridwall went beside the first one for a total of 24 square feet of hanging space on the divider alone.

Gotta figure out something to keep those buckets from banging around in transit.  Backpack mounted high enough that I can use it open or closed in here.

There are still a couple more square feet I could cover with gridwall (ha), but all my stuff is off the ground and easily accessible, so I think I'm done.  Probably.  Except for a couple more hooks, a shelf and a blanket bar.  (I might have a problem.)

While I was doing this, I also secured my fire extinguisher to the wall with a bungee cord (safety first, people!):

This wasn't a horse trailer, but it can happen to any trailer.  I could feel the heat from this as I passed in the left lane a few years ago.

With that, everything is off the floor!  Now to decide on a floor sweep so I can keep the shavings out.

Bottom line: If you're looking for an easy-to-install, lightweight, modular trailer, barn or tack stall organization system, you can't get any better than The Organized Barn and Trailer's HOSS system.  Bonus: FANTASTIC customer service and a small business you should want to support.

What: The Organized Barn and Trailer HOSS System

Price: Varies.  Shipping is EXPENSIVE, prepare yourselves, but they do what they can to price shop and get it as low as possible.

Legal stuff: I bought all this with my own money (gulp), and was not influenced or compensated by TOBT.  All opinions are my own.