Cardboard boxes or plastic containers?

As I am starting to arrange a rummage sale to prepare for the day we move over I am going through my things. We will need to rent a container to ship our things over to the UK and was wondering what you all thought of carboard and plastic containers to place our things in. I have almost everything now in plastic as when I had lived at home. Cardboard would pack better in a container, but could also ruin things if they got wet. Plastic could bust if something was moved wrong and still get wet. Any ideas?

When I moved over, the movers did all my packing for me. They used all cardboard and everything was fine. It hadn't occurred to me that my things could get wet! I just assumed they knew what they were doing! 

When my DH shipped his stuff to the US he mistakenly left some food in a plastic container when he packed.  It ended up getting packed in the corner of the cardboard box.  Sometime in the 8weeks his things were at sea, a rat chewed through the corner of the cardboard box and through the plastic to get to the food.  But other than that nothing got wet and it was all in cardboard.

About 1/3 of my stuff was in plastic boxes.  Everything on them arrived in perfect shape.  Some of the cardboard boxes had caved-in corners and punctures on the sides when they arrived.  The packers packed my ceramics and used cardboard.  I lost 2 large pieces.  If you can afford it or it's already packed in plastic, go with plastic.

I'm going with plastic, as I already have them and some of this stuff will be in storage (shed or garage) after I get there and I don't want them to get damp. 

Anyone have any feedback on clear (like the ones with white lids they sell at Target) versus say the rubbermaid roughneck type?  I originally wanted to go with the clear ones but one cracked on me yesterday when I had to nudge it out of the way so I'm worried the other type would handle more abuse.

My Rubbermaids came though  the best.  Some of the clear plastic ended up with cracks.  The rubbermaids were cheaper, too!  I put unbreakables and what needed to be located first in the clear boxes.

thanks.  Think I'll swap around what boxes I'm using to give away stuff then.

How do you ship with the rubbermaids? Do you just tape them up and slap an address on them? I am trying to get a mental picture. Also about how much does this cost, and how long does it take to get from the us to the uk?

I will be shipping by a container, with our beds and other items, so I will not be shipping them on there own.

Same here, Omega Shipping is shipping mine in a container with a few pieces of furniture.