Do you need a place to keep your lunch at work? Well, this article will give you options and show you a quick video of my portable mini refrigerator at work.
I try to make my working environment as pleasant and as homey as possible.
At my place of employment we have access to large refrigerators in the cafeteria but, to be honest, I don’t like having to walk that far to retrieve my lunch and, basically, I really don’t want to have to share a refrigerator with coworkers.
It’s not that I would mind sharing with a few coworkers but anyone can place their food in a company refrigerator.
I’ve also seen how dirty those refrigerators get at times. I needed to have my own personal refrigerator and asked my supervisor and he said no problem at all.
YouTube Video of My Mini Fridge for Cubicle
So I researched the ones that were available out there in the marketplace and found the one shown above. As you can see it fits perfectly under my desk at work in my cubicle.
You just have to find the right size if you want to place one under your own desk. I’ve seen others who have a closed office put a refrigerator like this in the corner of their office or on an available wall.
I bought the Magic Chef MCAR240B2 2.4 cubic feet fridge to store my lunch as well as my water bottle in my office cubicle. This mini refrigerator is literally on of my favorite cool office supplies which fits nicely under my desk.
I don’t even have to get up out of my chair to access it. It is out of the way and I just have to reach down during the day to have some cold water or to grab my sandwiches for lunch. Once again, this is one of those accessories for a cubicle that my coworkers always comment on because they want one of their own! They love my mini fridge for cubicle.
5 Benefits of a Cubicle Fridge at Work
1. Your Lunch and Beverages are Readily Available
You always have access to whatever you brought into work that day. Where I work the company refrigerators are a fairly long walk away. So it’s nice to have my portable mini refrigerator at my fingertips.
2. My Small Under Desk Refrigerator Fits Perfectly in My Cubicle
I made it a point to measure the distance from the bottom of my desk to the ground before I invested in a small cubicle refrigerator. I bought one that fits perfectly under my work desk.
3. You Can Keep Your Mini Cooler Spotless
My big complaint with the company refrigerators is that they aren’t clean enough. I hate opening up the company refrigerator door and foul aromas emanate from it that take away my appetite. With my own personal mini fridge, I make sure it is clean every day.
4. You Can Share With Your Favorite Coworkers
If you want, and I have done this, you can share your refrigerator with people you like in the office. Or you can keep your mini fridge for work all to yourself. I’ve actually done both because you have the control over your own property.
5. A Portable Small Refrigerator Adds a Homey Feeling to the Office
I like to make my office cubicle as homey as possible and I honestly think my portable mini refrigerator is the #1 accessory that makes my office feel more like home.
5 Other Uses for a Small Office Refrigerator
1. Store Baby Formula in a Nursery
If you have a baby in a nearby nursery or in a crib in your room, you can store baby food and formula in the mini fridge so that you don’t have to head down to the kitchen when your baby is hungry.
2. A Personal Mini Fridge is Great for a Home Gym
Anyone who works out at home drinks a lot of water, protein drinks, and oftentimes Gatorade. A portable fridge takes up a small amount of space and will allow you to easily access your sports drinks.
3. Makes for a Great Home Bar Accessory
I have a bar at my home and have a personal mini refrigerator behind my bar. I store beer, cold drinks, white wine, cherries, Rose’s lime juice, and anything else that I need to keep refrigerated related to my bar. I’m not sure what I would do without the extra storage space.
4. Perfect for a Home Office as Well
I have both a microwave and a portable mini refrigerator in my home office. I drink water throughout the day and other cold drinks. It makes it a whole lot easier than walking to the kitchen. It also provides overflow refrigeration if we need it.
5. Awesome for a Dorm Room
When my daughter was in college she always had a small portable refrigerator in her dorm room very similar to my fridge for office essentials in my cubicle. A small portable refrigerator is great for a dorm room and, from my experience visiting my daughters, widely used in the college environment.
My daughter couldn’t live without hers and it’s so convenient to store cold drinks, orange juice, left-overs from the night before, or midnight snacks.
3 Other Highly-Rated Portable Mini Refrigerators
Portable mini refrigerators are all over the marketplace but I’d like to highlight three highly-rated mini refrigerators below. You can’t go wrong with any of these for your office, dorm room, or for your bar at home.
All of the refrigerators above are a good value and come highly recommended. Make your cubicle the best that it can be with a mini refrigerator. Pick up one of these cool office gadgets and you certainly won’t regret it.
Frequently Asked Questions About a Portable Mini Refrigerator
Where should I place my office mini fridge?
Since these portable refrigerators have a very small footprint, you can basically place them anywhere near an outlet. I place my small refrigerator beneath my desk at work and it fits perfectly in that location. At home I have one behind my bar and in my home office it is under a table.
Can I plug a mini fridge in my bedroom?
The answer is a definitive YES! I have one in my home office which is just one of my bedrooms in my home. There is no reason why you can’t have a small portable refrigerator in a bedroom.
How long do mini fridges last?
From my experience they could last longer than a typical kitchen refrigerator. I’ve had one particular mini fridge for 10 years and it’s still going strong. Obviously it depends on the brand you purchase but just make sure you check ratings before you purchase. If there is an obvious design flaw you should find that in the reviews.
Do mini fridges keep food cold enough?
From my experience if you have a small portable fridge set properly, it should keep whatever you have in there cold enough. I haven’t found any issues with the ones I have purchased in the past. My drinks and any food I keep in them are properly cold enough.
Bob has been blogging for over 20 years and has been an office and cubicle dweller for more than 35 years. He has been featured in numerous online publications such as US News and World Report, Bustle, and Work Awesome (you can read his articles here). He created the popular office website CubicleBliss in January 2011 and rebranded it as WorkspaceBliss in April 2020.
In the office he’s been an IT Manager, Applications Engineer, Systems Analyst, Software Project leader, and Programmer Analyst in his long career. He’s a Certified Microsoft Professional and possesses a Masters of Science degree and two Bachelor of Science degrees, one of those in Informational Technology.
During his career he has worked in the office full-time, as a hybrid remote worker, and has worked from home permanently.