Until GameTrayz began designing high-quality premarket organizers for game publishers, nearly every insert included in every board game was awful. Made from cheap plastic, poorly organized, easily cracked and with lots of wasted box room, it often made sense to just throw the insert away and make your own organization system. This generally meant you had boxes filled with plastic bags of components, which doesn’t exactly facilitate setup.
To help better organize a complicated game’s components, an industry of aftermarket inserts has cropped up. These can speed up setup and tear down tremendously, and they activate whatever part of your brain that is pleased by organized things, but they can also be expensive and/or heavy. Here are some pros and cons of the product lines I am aware of.
The Broken Token
The OG. Broken Token was one of the first companies to successfully market its inserts, and it is still the best-known brand. It was founded in 2013, and in the eight years of its existence its organizers have become more innovative, decorative and stylistic.
Pros
- One of the original, most-trusted brands. Tried and true.
- Organizers made of laser-cut high-quality wood that is sturdy and looks great.
- Words and pictures laser etched into trays to label where everything goes.
- Lots of games covered.
- Has a line of branded crates for when your game outgrows a single box.
- Many other gaming accessories available made from the same material like dice towers, tabletop card holders, box bands and more. (The box bands are made of a different material, obviously).
Cons
- Probably most expensive option. Effectively doubles the price of a game.
- Heavy. Makes transporting the game slightly more difficult.
- Uncovered trays mean components will sometimes fall out if you store your games vertically.
Folded Space
Pros
- Much cheaper than Broken Token.
- Light (made out of Evacore).
- Lots of games covered.
- The company sells them B2B with friendly local game stores, so you can find them in many places and potentially avoid shipping costs. The Broken Token inserts are mainly available on its website.
Cons
- Requires glue to put together, no exceptions.
- Trays not labeled (includes a provided guidesheet to help reassemble trays and put all the components in the right place after gameplay).
- Evacore is slightly thicker than plywood, allowing less space for components.
- Uncovered trays mean components will sometimes fall out if you store your games vertically.
Gaming Trunk
Pros
- Canadian company.
- 3 colors of wood available.
- Assembly usually does not require glue.
- Has organizers available for some popular games the Broken Token stubbornly lacks: Clank!, Root, Azul, Gaia Project, the list goes on.
- Includes clear covers on trays to keep tokens from falling out.
- Digital .stl files of organizers available for 3D printing at cheaper rates, if that’s what you prefer.
Cons
- Canadian company.
- Even heavier than the Broken Token organizers.
- Around as expensive as Broken Token organizers.
- Not quite as easy to snap together as the Broken Token. Sometimes requires bending a piece of wood (it’s scored for that purpose so it won’t break, but it is weird and a little hard to get in the right shape).
- No social media presence and minimal reviews mean quality control is often a leap of faith.
Thingiverse
Not really an insert brand, but this is a great way to get box organizers nonetheless. Thingiverse is a collection of shared 3D printing files, and it includes a lot of designs made for specific games. This extends far beyond organizers; one of my favorites is a high-quality tower for Suburbia to replace the crappy cardboard one that comes in the collector’s edition.
Pros
- Essentially limitless options.
- Printed trays are sturdy but not too heavy.
- Ability to easily seek other printable accessories.
- Potentially cheap if you have access to a 3D printer. If you are a university student and your school has a 3D printing lab, you can probably print these for free.
Cons
- “Things” have various quality levels, and it’s hard to confirm quality control.
- Takes some knowledge of using .STL files even if you’re not the one running the 3D printer.
- Potentially expensive if you don’t have easy access to a 3D printer.
- 3D printers struggle to create smooth surfaces, so most of the surfaces will have small ridges. Not a big problem for trays but it can be a problem for 3D-printed tokens because they’re harder to slide across some types of surfaces.
Etsy
Also not truly an insert brand, but you can find many different types of organizers and accessories on Etsy. PLA inserts already 3D printed, laser-cut wood, and unique handmade items are all available… if you can find what you want.
Pros
- Large array of options.
- Personal touch in sales.
- Get to benefit from individuals’ creativeness.
- Lots of different types of materials available.
Cons
- Can be difficult to find the right thing.
- Some sellers have higher quality items than other sellers.
- Not everything you might want is available.
- Shipping and material costs can add up and get quite expensive.
Realistically, there are too many Etsy sellers to reasonably list them all. I can tell you the shops I’ve bought from, but as I don’t do reviews I will not be evaluating them: A neoprene Spirit Island playmat from ImmersiveMeeple, 3D-printed Spirit Island tokens from BGHQ and BoardGameBitsUK, Laser-cut wooden Marvel Champions insert and dividers from OneSharpJoeCrafts, interlinking Keyforge chains from StrategicDino and a replacement Villainous Cauldron from n3rDyprinting.
Foamcore inserts
Some hobbyists prefer to make their own inserts out of foamcore. Sometimes this means cutting foam pieces into measured shapes and gluing them together to make trays. Sometimes it means filling their box with a large piece of foam core and then carving out spots where they want the pieces to go. Pub Meeple has a detailed tutorial on making these. Some companies have tried to make this a little easier by offering “pluck foam trays,” which you can manipulate to a lesser extent but without the need for carving instruments and skill. They have pre-scored foam so you can just pluck individual squares out with your hands. Much less customizable.
Pros
- Very cheap and light.
- Infinitely customizable.
- Provides creative fulfillment.
- Easier to make room for Components of Unusual Shape (e.g. Spirit Island boards, Villainous cauldron, Quacks of Quedlinberg cauldron boards) than other inserts.
Cons
- You have to design the inserts yourself.
- Requires more tools and assembly than any other option.
- Not a tremendously sturdy material; If you have heavy game pieces you will need a thicker tray wall or it will break.
The Rest
In recent years, lots of smaller companies have cropped up offering products made of laser-cut wood or some type of foamcore. I’ve never tried any of these brands and I don’t have a tremendous amount to say about them except that they might have designs for games that the Broken Token is lacking. I have listed as many brands as I could find that have their own websites and e-commerce platforms (thus excluding brands that are exclusively sold on Etsy. I’m including those in the above category). Please let me know which ones I missed.
Editor’s Note: This post was updated in the Folded Space and Etsy sections. Among other things, Folded Space inserts are made of “Evacore” rather than “Evercore,” an investment banking advisory firm.” The Tabletop Tribune regrets the error.