Collections (Stamps, Baseball Cards, etc...)
Most people really only need a fire rated safe. For home owners protecting flammables, we recommend at least 1-hour of fire protection. If your collection is extremely valuable, you will want both a fire rated and burglary rated safe.
Tax Returns, Insurance Papers, Wills, Passports, etc...
Safes with at least 1-hour of fire protection should suffice for homes less than 3,000 sf.
Jewelry or Other Items of Large Value
You need to consider the value of the jewelry. We recommend burglary rated safes for collections over ,000. Burglary rated safes typically come with 2-hour fire ratings so they can easily protect documents as well.
Corporate Records (Data disks, employee files, etc...)
For data Storage, you want a safe with both fire and burglary protection. Many come with water protection as well. Fire protection should be at least 2-hours to sustain the heat generated and length of burn of large building fires. Data safes are ideal but large business safes and gun safes are used frequently.
Firearms and Guns
Gun safes offer both burglary and fire protection. Gun safes come with a wide range of options depending on your needs. If your main interest is simply to keep young children away from the firearms, low end and less expensive safes will suffice. If you are protecting a valuable collection the larger burglary rated and fire protected safes may be desired. We see many homeowners and businesses use gun safes to protect cash, valuables, and paperwork because the price per square inch is inexpensive when compared to other safes.
Cash Management (for businesses that want to protect frequent cash drops--such as restaurants)
Drop safes, Deposit Safes, or Money Management Safes can be used to protect cash accrued throughout the day. Drop Safes allow for frequent cash drops and can be mounted under counters. Deposit safes are larger and used for more permanent Storage. These safes offer no fire protection so they are not recommended for long-term Storage, or when no one would be around if a fire started.
Money management safes can also have different sections. One section allows for access to daily or limited founds and another section remains isolated with owner access only. Some come with several drop sections to accommodate deposits from separate shifts or managers. The lower section may have a fire rating.
When secrecy is your #1 concern
If you don't want someone in your home knowing there is a safe there, floor safes are a great option. In our opinion, wall safes just don't offer enough storage space to be useful. Floor safes can only be installed in floors that are not post tension slabs. To identify a post tension slab look for a marking stamped into the concrete at the entrance to the garage.
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