Emergency Supply Checklist: What to Keep and When to Rotate

The storm warning comes in on a Tuesday afternoon. By Tuesday evening the store shelves are bare: no water, no batteries, no bread. You go home and dig out the emergency kit you packed two years ago and find flashlight batteries that leak, crackers that taste like cardboard, and water jugs you can't remember filling.

An emergency kit only helps if it's ready when you need it. The packing part is easy. The hard part is keeping it current, because almost everything in it has a date: water, food, batteries, medicine. Here's what to keep, how much, and a simple schedule for rotating it so nothing goes bad on the shelf.

One note before we start: this is general organizing advice. For storm and evacuation guidance where you live, follow your local emergency management office and Ready.gov.

Start with water and food

Water and food are the core of any kit, and they're the things most likely to run out first.

Ready.gov recommends storing at least one gallon of water per person per day for several days, for drinking and sanitation. For a family of four, three days means 12 gallons. Don't forget pets: they need water too.

For food, Ready.gov suggests at least a several-day supply of non-perishable food. Pick things your household already eats and that don't need cooking or much water:

• Canned beans, tuna, chicken, soup, and vegetables
• Peanut butter and crackers
• Cereal, granola, and protein or granola bars
• Dried fruit and nuts
• Shelf-stable milk or juice boxes
• Comfort food, like a favorite snack for the kids

Add a manual can opener. It's the item people most often forget, and it makes half the food above useless if it's missing.

Add the basics for a power outage

After water and food, plan for no electricity, no phone signal, and no running water for a few days. Ready.gov's basic kit list includes:

• A flashlight and extra batteries
• A battery-powered or hand-crank radio (one with NOAA Weather Radio)
• A first aid kit
• A cell phone charger and a backup battery
• A whistle to signal for help
• Moist towelettes, garbage bags, and plastic ties for sanitation
• A wrench or pliers to turn off utilities
• Dust masks, plastic sheeting, scissors, and duct tape
• Local maps

Then add what your household needs on top of the basics: prescription medicines and glasses, infant formula and diapers, pet food, copies of important documents, some cash, and a change of clothes with sturdy shoes.

Keep it all in one place

A kit spread across three closets isn't a kit. Pick one spot and keep everything together, ideally somewhere cool, dry, and easy to grab: a hall closet, a shelf in the basement, or a couple of bins by the garage door.

A few tips that help:

• Use clear bins with lids so you can see what's inside and keep out moisture.
• Label each bin (Water, Food, Light and Power, First Aid) so anyone in your home can find things in the dark.
• Keep a small "grab it" bag with the most important items in case you need to leave quickly.
• Store canned food somewhere cool and dry, and boxed food in sealed containers, as Ready.gov suggests.

If you already keep backup supplies in the garage or basement, our guide to tracking household supplies covers setting up zones and a simple count.

Write down what's in it, with dates

This is the step that keeps a kit useful, and the one most people skip.

Make a short list of everything in the kit with three things for each item: what it is, how many, and the date that matters. For food and medicine, that's the expiration or best-by date. For water you filled yourself, it's the date you filled it.

"Canned black beans, 6 cans, best by March 2027" is plenty. Put the soonest dates at the top. Now you can see what needs attention without opening every bin.

Rotate it on a schedule

Rotating means using up items before they expire and replacing them with fresh ones. A simple schedule:

Every 6 months:

• Replace water you bottled yourself. Ready.gov says water that wasn't commercially bottled should be replaced every six months. Keep store-bought water sealed in its original container in a cool, dark place, and check any date on the label.
• Check food dates. Move anything expiring in the next few months into your kitchen and eat it, then buy fresh replacements for the kit. This is first in, first out applied to your emergency shelf.
• Test the flashlight and radio, and swap batteries that are low or close to their date.
• Check medicines and first aid supplies for expired items.

Once a year:

• Rethink what your household needs. Ready.gov recommends updating your kit every year as your family's needs change: a new baby, a new pet, kids who've outgrown the spare clothes, or a new prescription.

A good habit is to tie the 6-month check to dates you already remember, like the clock changes in spring and fall. Many people check smoke alarms then too. Our seasonal home maintenance checklist has more jobs that fit the same rhythm.

Use what you rotate out

Rotating doesn't have to mean waste. Food coming out of the kit is usually still well within its date, so it goes straight into your normal meals. Canned soup becomes lunch. Granola bars go into school bags. Peanut butter goes into the pantry.

The trick is to rotate early, a few months before the date, not the week it expires. If something does end up close to its date, our guide on what to do with food that's about to expire has easy ways to use it up.

Doing it with Domesio

If a paper list taped to the bin keeps getting lost, Domesio is a free home inventory and shopping list app that can hold your kit list for you. Add a location called Emergency Kit, add each item with its quantity and expiration date, and see what to use first. Set a low-stock alert on the basics, like water and batteries, so they show up on your Low Stock list when you're running short.

For the rotation itself, Domesio's tasks let you set a repeating household to-do, like "Check the emergency kit" every six months, and assign it to someone. Everyone in your home can share the same household, so whoever is home when a storm warning comes in can see exactly what's on the shelf.

Either way, an afternoon of packing and a check twice a year means your kit is ready before the shelves at the store are empty.