About Us

Plantabox - Home of the Personalised Apple Crate 

From humble beginnings - when our apple crates were hand-stencilled at the kitchen table and sold as garden planters - to sophisticated printing machines and an extensive range of unique gift crate ideas, Plantabox still maintains the same attention to detail and customer-focussed ethos in everything we do. Whether you're looking for a toy box for the kids, unique wedding day decorations, or a gift for a special occasion, you can be sure that everything we create is hand-crafted with the same love and care. And, of course, the design of every item we produce - from fabulous colour options to personalisation - is driven by you. 

Based in East Sussex, we ship our products all over the UK and can also deliver to Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden & Switzerland. We've had the pleasure of working with some fabulous customers but behind our continued growth and success is a small team of amazing people who are a joy to work with and take pride in everything they do.  

Our personalised wooden apple crates re-create the traditional apple crate or bushel box of yesteryear but made from high quality, sustainable pine treated for outdoor use with the option to be personalised with the wording of your choice.

Not only do they make superb personalised gifts for any occasion, our personalised wooden fruit crates have been used for gift hampers, storage systems, marketing events, point of sale and display purposes and have even graced the TV screens in Market Kitchen, Kirstie's Homemade Home, 60 minute makeover, This Morning, Great British Menu, Big Brother, ITV's Love Your Garden and Masterchef, to name but a few. From our original Large personalised wooden crate we've added the Square and Small wooden crates, and the range has grown over the years, as we’ve launched a Seed Tray, a windowsill crate, medium crate and a mini crate which is very cute. And more recently we've expanded into all sorts of personalised wooden gifts, from wooden tablet holders to raised planters! 

A Short History of the Apple Crate or Bushel Box

Also known as bushel boxes, fruit growing farms used these original wooden apple crates when harvesting their apples, pears and plums. Air could circulate through the slats of wood, keeping the fruit in the best possible condition. The wood fruit crates were sometimes reinforced with wire as once loaded with fruit and stacked on top of each other, they were very heavy. Farms invariably had their names printed on the wooden crates as well as charging 5 shillings for them which was refundable upon return. By identifying the fruit crates and charging, this helped to ensure their safe return. 
 
Some wooden fruit crates date back to the 1930s and such originals are in great demand, although becoming more scarce to track down. Now used as storage crates, as well as wooden planters. 

An array of personalisation options

The choices of colours has expanded to 13 options and continue to develop, personalisation options have also been enhanced, and we can also add wheels, bespoke liners and a whole range of accessories to the crates. What has not changed is the interest and delight that so many customers have conveyed at having found such a unique personalised wooden fruit crate gift.

All variations of the personalised wooden gifts can be ordered by following the easy-to-use process in our shop. If you have an enquiry for your business you can find out more information here of our trade services.