Milk crate

For all practical purposes, both hold similar internal volumes, but tea chests are designed for shipping over the open ocean.

[citation needed] Milk crates are often stolen for either personal or business use or for the plastic that they are made out of.

These products competed with higher-end proprietary modular plastic storage cube systems, such as the Finnish "Palaset" line marketed by Design Research; the consumer-grade storage crates varied widely in price, quality, and sturdiness compared to their commercial counterparts.

The basic milk crate stackable design was often modified to also allow stacking with the openings facing sideways rather than upwards, thus creating a bookshelf-like set of storage compartments.

In July 2008, Walmart and some other stores introduced a square milk jug that does not need to be transported in a crate.