One of the many challenges that you face in an ice sculpting business is keeping track of your equipment. And the easiest pieces of equipment to lose track of are your display trays. Right now, for example, I have three different trays in three different cities that need to be picked up. I'm going to try and get to two of them while I'm running other errands in the next day or two, but the other one will have to wait. You don't want to wait too long though, because the longer you wait, the better the odds that you'll somehow forget where a tray went to, or that "something" will happen to the tray. More than once, a client has offered me a tray, explaining that another carver left the tray there a while back and that they needed to get it out of the way. Other times, I've had to charge for broken trays, maybe because during breakdown, they tried to lift the sculpture using the tray!

    I faced an extreme version of this situation following Hurricane Katrina in 2005. In the chaos of preparing to evacuate my family, picking up stray display trays was low on my priority list. As it turned out, I'd left an expensive Gourmet Display rotating tray at a Ritz Carlton and a long EPI tray at a Fairmont. Both of these hotels were significantly damaged by the flooding. After the rebuilding of New Orleans began, I was able to sneak into the Ritz and get my rotating tray back. This was made significantly easier by the fact that they'd ripped out the walls in the lower flooded floors, leaving bare studs. To get around a locked door, you walked through the walls. Luckily, the tray had been left where they often stored it (on an unflooded floor) and I was able to walk out without being challenged. (I wonder how many other things walked out of the hotel during those days, perhaps unaccompanied by rightful owners.) As for the tray at the Fairmont, that one was MIA. The hotel was completely locked down and the next time I was able to get back in there was four years later when it was being reopened as a Waldorf Astoria property. I didn't bother to ask if they still had my tray.

    Unless you only sculpt ice for one place or only for venues that have their own trays, you'll probably run into tray tracking problems eventually. One solution to the problem is to forget about it completely and use "disposable" trays. I make it clear beforehand that I will not be returning to pick up the sculpture and display equipment and that the client or the venue is responsible for breakdown, but that they can keep the equipment. This eliminates a significant amount of time that would otherwise have to be devoted to recovering equipment. The disposable tray, lighting, etc. are not a large expense, but also built into the cost of the sculpture.

    Now these drip pans aren't really disposable, not like something like a diaper is. What they are is somewhat flimsy and inexpensive. The disposable part is optional; they can be used many times before they're too beat up to do the job. In fact, they're excellent starter trays if you're new to ice carving and would prefer to spend your money on tools instead of display trays. When I deliver to certain venues, they’ll sometimes hold on to old trays and give them back to me so that I can use them elsewhere.

    Aesthetically, these trays are not fantastic. But they're low profile and can usually be hidden fairly easily by linens or floral if the situation demands it. If you use linens, though, make sure that the fabric is either completely in or out of the drip pan. Absorbent linens that straddle the tray boundary will "sponge" water out and partly defeat the purpose of the tray.

The tray drain assembly is simple and straightforward and can be easily attached to the drip pan

    The trays come in a number of different sizes: 41”x21”, 27”x21”, & 24”x18” are a few that I’ve found useful.  An interesting and useful aspect of these trays however, is that they can be linked together. The plastic in the tray is thin and the edges of the trays match up and can overlap. Simply use clear tape to hold them together, and suddenly your tray is twice as big. This sort of linking is generally not possible with standard display trays. However, you may have to alter your sculpture some if it has to straddle the trays. Sometimes, I’ve cut a notch into the bottom of my sculpture and other times, I’ve set additional base ice in both trays and the sculpture rested on top of the base pieces, above the overlapping edges.

The photo above illustrates how trays can be linked simply by overlapping their edges. Clear tape is then used to hold them together.

    To light sculptures in these trays, you can either set lights behind your sculpture or you can set the tray on top of a specially cut styrofoam riser. These risers have holes cut in the center that will accommodate lighting. (see the image below) This set up is especially useful if you’re using battery operated LED lighting which eliminates the need for an electrical cord running to the display.

a styrofoam riser that’s used to elevate the tray slightly so that the sculpture can be underlit (image courtesy of Ice Crafters)

   Obviously, one of the main advantages of disposable trays that they’re pretty cheap. But how cheap? How much does it cost you to buy the display equipment for each sculpture? As this article is being written, if you buy a case at a time, you might pay $6.00 per tray. If you factor in shipping, it might be about $7.00 for the tray. An inexpensive fluorescent light might be $8.00. If you use a riser, they go for $5.75, so perhaps $7.00/riser including shipping. (maybe a little more because they take up a lot of space in a box) If you throw in a drain bucket and a cheap extension cord for the lighting, you’re up to about $26 for a complete display set up. This is fairly easy to work into the price of a sculpture, especially considering that you don’t have to spend time and gas recovering your equipment. Interesting in finding out more? Check out the disposable/reusable plastic drip pan page on icecrafters.com for more options and pricing.