We made our own...we are frugal too. We wanted to be sure that we liked composting before investing. (BTW we LOVE it!) WE took a large trash can and drilled holes down the sides to allow air in and water out. We have an old garden claw we used to aerate it. It has worked like a charm. We haven't had any critter issues (which was my concern). The only problem that came up was we could get to the good compost on the bottom, we were dumping the composter over and shoveling to the compost and then refilling the can. It got a little messy, so our solution has been to build another bin. Instead on dumping it on the ground and then shoveling it, we shovel the refuse in to the other bin - it saved us a step. Since we only have to worry about this problem a few times a year, it hasn't deterred us. Right now we are happy with our homemade solution, but if we ever upgrade we want to get one of those that has the drawers to get to the good stuff.