Self Storage Industry Blog

How to Stop Tenants From Tailgating Your Storage Facility’s Gate

Wouldn’t it be nice run a storage facility where every tenant followed the rules...

What to Do When Tenants Leave Units Dirty

While some surprises are nice, such as discovering that your box wholesaler has a deal that will save your storage facility m...

Networking at Self Storage Conventions

Are you about to attend your first self storage convention? Or have you gone to several but can’t quite get the knack of netw...

Transferring a Unit from One Customer to Another

Managing a self storage facility is one of those jobs where surprising new situa...

How to Create Mobile Friendly Marketing

77% of Americans now have smartphones. In fact, a lot of your tenants probably found you via an internet search on their smar...

Installing Electrical Outlets in Storage Units

If you’re looking for ways to improve your storage facility, you may be considering installing outlets in the units. Is it a ...

What If Someone Gets Hurt at Your Storage Facility?

There are always risks to running a business, but we don’t always think about th...

Influencer Marketing and Self Storage

You’ve seen the posts on Instagram and Facebook: smiling social media mavens posing with everything from charcoal toothpaste ...

10 Best Markets for Wine Storage

As industry insiders know, self storage in the U.S. has been expanding for decades. Many facilities even offer more specific ...

When Self Storage Tenants Divorce

Self storage operators often cite divorce as one of the main reasons people use self storage. The splitting up of a marriage ...

Do Millennials Value Customer Service or Automation?

The answer to this question depends on what part of your business you’re talking...

6 Ways to Communicate Better with Tenants

When running a self storage business, it’s important to have effective ways to communicate with customers. Customers who aren...

Five Ways to Market Self Storage to Female Customers

No demographic is a monolith. That should be every self storage marketing profes...

Long Term vs. Short Term Customers

Here’s a basic question you may have considered. Should your storage facility focus on long term or short term renters? Of co...

Working with a Call Center

You have a smoothly-running self storage operation with high occupancy, satisfied customers, and top-of-the-line security. Ye...

Investing in an Older Storage Facility

As self storage continues to grow as an industry, you may be thinking about starting a self storage business, or expanding yo...

Seven Amenities Self Storage Tenants Will Pay Extra For

In a competitive self storage market, it’s tempting to want to give away a few t...

Should You Accept Packages for Commercial Self Storage Tenants?

Any business that keeps stock needs a place to store it. They may sell books, cl...

Do You Have To Turn Over Surveillance Footage to the Police?

As a self storage operator, your relationship with law enforcement is balanced b...

What Happens When RV/Boat/Vehicle Storage Renters Don’t Pay Their Rent

Self storage auctions take place all the time. When you rent units to hundreds o...

How to Cater to Customers with Disabilities

Your storage facility has all sorts of customers, and you want all of them to feel welcome. For your customers with disabilit...

What to do When Tenants Abandon Cremains

It’s a shockingly common problem among self storage operators. A tenant abandons their storage unit and leaves behind cremain...

Is the Airbnb of Storage Going to Disrupt the Industry?

In 2017, Neighbor, the self-proclaimed Airbnb of self storage, launched with 2.5...

How to Tailor Your Resume for a Career in Self Storage

Creating a resume is a tricky business. You want to include all your past jobs a...

Helping a Tenant Move Between Units

As a self storage operator, you want to make moving between units as easy as possible for your tenants. A good experience for...

4 Types of Difficult Self Storage Customers (And How to Deal With Them)

We’ve talked about customers who hoard items and those who don’t pay their rent—...

Six Tips on Attending the ISS World Expo From Editor Amy Campbell

Each April, Inside Self Storage brings more than 3,600 prospective and veteran s...

How Many People Should Have Access to a Storage Unit?

You’d think that renting a self storage unit would be easy. Someone comes in and...

Hiring Someone With No Storage Experience

When looking for new employees, you want to hire the best workers possible, and that generally means hiring people with prior...

7 Quirky Ideas for Setting Your Storage Facility Apart from the Competition

When it comes to setting your self storage business apart from the competition, ...

How to Decrease Your Storage Facility’s Carbon Footprint

As environmental awareness rises, you may be wondering how you can make your sto...

Under New Management: Advice for Taking Over an Existing Storage Facility

Starting a new business can be tough, and as many as 90% of startups fail, accor...

What Rules Should a Storage Facility Enforce?

You know the old saying, “I don’t make the rules; I just enforce them”? Well, sometimes you make them too. As a self storage ...

What to Do When the Police Show Up at Your Facility

Even the safest, most secure storage facilities receive the occasional visit fro...

Fire Safety for Storage Facility Operators

Fire is a serious danger that takes people by surprise at school, work, and home. It destroys belongings, causes terrible inj...

Choosing the Right Security Camera System for Your Storage Facility

Whether you’re upgrading your camera security system or getting one for a brand ...

Hooray for Autopay: Five Reasons Why Your Storage Facility Should Convert

According to a recent poll conducted by Inside Self Storage, less than half of s...

7 Ways to Keep Your Storage Facility Clean

There are huge benefits to keeping your storage facility clean. It creates a great first impression to new customers and keep...

On-Site vs. Off-Site Manager

Have you ever considered having an on-site manager at your facility—someone who lives there and can keep an eye on the place,...

Essential Things to Consider When Dealing with Commercial Self Storage Users

When you run a self storage facility, you have individuals and families renting ...

What to Do if a Tenant Loiters

Every storage facility has that tenant. You know the one. The tenant who is always there. The one who spends hours in his sto...

A Self Storage Operator’s Guide to Pinterest

Looking to expand your social media presence? It can be tough to select which ne...

How To Turn Over Vacant Storage Units Faster

One of the goals of any self storage facility is to fill as many units as possible, thereby maximizing revenue. It can be a c...

Preventing Storage Auctions

Contrary to what some tenants might think, most self storage operators see storage auctions as a last resort. After all, the ...

How to Grow Your Self Storage Career with LinkedIn

Do you want to get grow your self storage career or break into the industry for ...

Preventing Mold at Your Storage Facility

As we all learn in grammar school, there are germs everywhere. When it comes to keeping your storage facility clean, excess m...

How Your Storage Facility Can Earn a Great Reputation in the RV Community

Do you want to move into the RV storage market? Do you already offer RV storage ...

Should You Charge a Security Deposit on Storage Unit Rentals?

As a self storage facility manager, you know that there is extra work to do ever...

How One California Storage Facility is Giving Back This Holiday Season

‘Tis the season for stockings hung by the fire and Christmas trees surrounded by...

What to Do If a Self Storage Tenant’s Rent Check Bounces

Checkbooks often feel obsolete, but every self storage operator still knows a fe...

6 Marketing Tips for Small Self Storage Businesses

Marketing is a tricky business. What worked in decades past doesn’t work quite a...

How to Hire a Professional Auctioneer for a Storage Auction

Storage auctions have become somewhat of a spectator sport in the last few years...

5 Things You Should Do to Prepare Your Storage Facility For Winter

Preparing your storage facility for winter is all about taking advantage of the ...

What to Do if You Suspect a Tenant is Storing Illegal Drugs

This is a tricky subject for any self storage operator, and for many reasons. If...

6 Signs Your Facility is Outdated

Life moves pretty fast, and with it come with new advancements. Today, all sorts of businesses run differently than they once...

Keep Pests Out of Mobile Storage Units With These Tips

Pest control at a storage facility is a tedious task at best and a never-ending ...

Should You Focus on Customer Retention or Customer Acquisition?

It’s a common self storage dilemma. You want to increase your occupancy, but you...

How to Handle Tenants Who Give Partial Payments

Partial payments from tenants can be tricky. On the one hand, you surely understand how a tenant can go into a financial slum...

How Your Storage Facility Can Give Back This Christmas

Christmas is coming soon! It’s never too early to start thinking about the most ...

Going Offline: Which Old Fashioned Marketing Strategies Still Work?

Remember marketing before the internet? Advertising your storage facility was a ...

Hosting a Customer Appreciation Day at Your Storage Facility

When running a self storage business, you’re always on the lookout for ways to k...

6 Ways Your Storage Facility Can Be Charitable

When researching ways for self storage facilities to be charitable year-round, one word kept coming up. Drive. As in food dri...

16 Questions to Ask When Interviewing for a Self Storage Job

Interviewing for a self storage job—or any job, for that matter—can be nerve wra...

How to Choose Which Retail Products to Offer

So, you’ve decided to expand your self storage business with retail products. That’s a great move! Years ago, not many storag...

7 Ways to Learn From Your Competition

One of the big challenges to running a self storage operation is keeping up with or surpassing the competition. After all, if...

10 Moving Tips to Pass Along to Tenants

A self storage operator’s job is so much more than offering customers extra space. The self storage industry is about conveni...

Eight Podcasts Every Self Storage Operator Should Listen To

A growing number of Americans turn to podcasts to help them stay informed, make ...

Lessons in Phone Etiquette for Self Storage Employees

If you’ve ever had a customer service job—in self storage or some other industry...

12 Ways to Find Your Storage Facility’s Target Audience on Facebook

Advertising your storage facility on Facebook seems simple, but then you click t...

Decorating Your Storage Facility for Halloween

Halloween is rolling around soon, a time of costumes, candy, and frights. If you’re a self storage operator, don’t miss the o...

How to Find Work/Life Balance as a Resident Self Storage Manager

So, you’re interested in working in self storage as a resident manager. Perhaps ...

What to Do If Your Storage Facility Receives an Inaccurate Review on Yelp

Getting negative feedback on your self storage business is tough. You work hard ...

Should You Intervene if a Tenant is a Hoarder?

Hoarding can be a serious problem. Many people who hoard fill their homes with things they don’t need—items that they’ve accu...

How to Attract Boat Storage Renters

To attract self storage renters anywhere, you need competitive prices, friendly, helpful employees, and a clean, secure facil...

What to Expect When Interviewing for a Self Storage Job

Whether you’re looking to break into the self storage industry for the first tim...

How to Fire a Self Storage Employee with Compassion

Firing an employee who works at your storage facility is hard. Not only is it ha...

RV Terms That Every Self Storage Operator Should Know

Every profession, hobby, and passion has its own vocabulary. Those in the know u...

The 5 Most Common Self Storage Tenant Complaints and How You Should Address Them

Some self storage customer complaints are justified and others are totally crazy...

Team Building Tips for Your Self Storage Staff

For some people, a job is just a job. They don’t particularly want to be at work, and though they may not hate it, they would...

Renting to Homeless Tenants

In self storage, we generally expect tenants in certain situations. Some are in the process of moving and use their unit as a...

Designing a Billboard for Your Storage Facility

Have you ever driven by one of those “Your ad here” billboards on the highway and wondered what it would be like if your stor...

How to Properly Inform Tenants When Raising Rent

Every stable economy is going to have inflation, and as prices go up, so must se...

Adding Truck Rental to Your Storage Facility

Adding a truck or two to your self storage business can help in numerous ways. First, think of it like you would about sellin...

10 Signs That Your Storage Facility’s Website is Outdated

We’ve all seen cringe worthy websites. You know the ones. The websites with miss...

How to Help New Tenants Understand Their Leases

Each self storage facility will have at least one version of its lease, especially if the company operates in more than one s...

The Top 5 Skills That Will Advance Your Self Storage Career

Just started working in self storage? Congratulations; you’ve chosen a career in...

Small Screen Marketing: YouTube for Self Storage

Almost one third of everyone who uses the Internet looks at YouTube every single...

7 Ways to Impress Your Summer Self Storage Tenants

Summer is coming fast! Think of the approaching summer in the same way you’d thi...

Should You Be Advertising Your Storage Facility on the Radio?

Decades ago, businesses knew how to advertise. They would get their service or p...

What to Do If a Tenant is Storing Prohibited Items

There are some things you just don’t want in your self storage facility. These i...

7 Things You Must Communicate to First Time Self Storage Renters

When a new customer signs a lease with your facility, you can’t assume that they...

How to Handle Excessively Rude Customers

Every once in awhile, you’re bound to encounter a tenant at your storage facility who crosses the line from rude to downright...

When Tenants Leave Items Behind

Daily lock checks are important to the functioning of any self storage facility, and they can turn up some strange things. To...

Is Customer Appreciation an Effective Self Storage Marketing Tool?

There’s a difference between customer service and customer appreciation. Great c...

Tips for a More Environmentally Friendly Storage Facility

Having an environmentally friendly business is a big topic these days. Global cl...

Why 2017 Is the Year to Advertise Your Storage Facility on Twitter

When Twitter launched in 2006, its 140-characters-or-less form of communication ...

Are You Doing Enough to Keep Your Facility Secure?

Security is one of the big selling points in self storage. Customers want to kno...

5 Ways to Recruit Your Best Self Storage Staff Ever

What is your storage facility’s hiring process like? Do you advertise the positi...

Attracting Self Storage Customers in an Oversaturated Market

Self storage is a huge industry. If you’re lucky, you run a facility in an area ...

4 Types of Discrimination Your Self Storage Business Might Be Overlooking

None of us like to think of ourselves as discriminatory. But as self storage ope...

Disaster Averted: How to Prevent Accidents at Your Self Storage Facility

Accidents happen. As a self storage operator, it’s your job to do everything you...

Make Your Job Easier By Giving Your Tenants These 5 Self Storage Tips

It goes without saying that when you do your job right as a self storage operato...

A Closer Look at the Retail Aspect of Your Self Storage Facility

When it comes to self storage, most people think of the basic service: providing...

Self Storage Marketing Techniques That No Longer Work

Technology is rapidly advancing. This is the most obvious with computers, includ...

The Life and Responsibilities of a Resident Self Storage Manager

Have you ever considered looking for work as a self storage resident manager? Pe...

5 Unexpected Ways to Wow Tenants

As a self storage operator, many of the customers you interact with everyday are experiencing major life changes. They may be...

Should You Join Your Local Chamber of Commerce?

Have you just started your self storage business, or opened a branch in a new area? Then you may be wondering if it’s worth i...

The 5 Most Important Questions to Ask When Interviewing Self Storage Job Candidates

Should You Let a Tenant Store That?

As a self storage facility operator, you want to protect your property and business from legal problems, fires, pests, and mo...

How to Deal With Abandoned Storage Units

There’s an unlocked, unpaid for storage unit at your facility. It’s frustrating enough that your tenant hasn’t paid rent on h...

What to Do If A Self Storage Tenant Dies

While hopefully your storage facility doesn’t have to deal with tenant deaths often, it’s important to know the proper proced...

Freshen Up Your Facility

Nothing says “Welcome in!” like cleanliness. You can have the warmest logo and the most comforting colors in your office and ...

The Dos and Don’ts of Responding to Self Storage Reviews

At some point, every self storage facility starts receiving reviews. Even those ...

Security Breach: How Your Storage Facility Can Recover from Theft

Theft can be devastating for anyone, from individuals with homes to business own...

Book Review: “Self Storage” by Jay Bonansinga

As self storage continues to become a bigger part of American life, it’s only natural that it will increasingly become a sett...

How to Cater to Military Storage Users

Active members of the armed forces have unique needs from businesses. This is especially true when it comes to self storage. ...

Head of the Class: Attracting College Self Storage Renters to Your Facility

If your storage facility is located near a college campus, bringing in new custo...

Should You Screen Your Self Storage Tenants?

Self storage facilities are prone to experiencing some pretty strange things. This can include tenants living in their storag...

How to Keep Pests Out of Your Storage Facility

Nothing can spoil a tenant’s view of a self storage facility quite like entering one’s unit and finding a pest infestation. I...

Can Your Storage Facility Weather the Storm?

You’ve worked hard to grow your self storage business, so of course you want to protect it. Your facility’s biggest asset—the...

4 Ways to Prevent Tenants From Living in Their Storage Units

A few weeks ago, a guy known only by the username 007craft started a thread on R...

Your Storage Facility as Community Hero

Do you want your self storage facility to be just another local business, or do you want it to have a positive reputation in ...

How to Win Over Customers With a Tour of Your Storage Facility

The next time a prospective tenant asks for a tour of your storage facility, thi...

4 Things You Must Do Before Holding a Self Storage Auction

Ask most self storage facility managers and they’ll tell you: The best storage a...

5 New Year’s Resolutions for Your Storage Facility

What’s your New Year’s resolution? Maybe you want to exercise more, quit smoking...

Tips for Training and Inspiring Self Storage Staff

Your storage facility’s staff are an extension of your business. They have the p...

Turning Likes Into Customers: Social Media Marketing for Self Storage

The future of marketing your storage facility doesn’t exist on paper; it exists ...

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How to Stop Tenants From Tailgating Your Storage Facility’s Gate

What to Do When Tenants Leave Units Dirty

Networking at Self Storage Conventions

Transferring a Unit from One Customer to Another

How to Create Mobile Friendly Marketing

Installing Electrical Outlets in Storage Units

What If Someone Gets Hurt at Your Storage Facility?

Influencer Marketing and Self Storage

10 Best Markets for Wine Storage

When Self Storage Tenants Divorce

Do Millennials Value Customer Service or Automation?

6 Ways to Communicate Better with Tenants

Five Ways to Market Self Storage to Female Customers

Long Term vs. Short Term Customers

Working with a Call Center

Investing in an Older Storage Facility

Seven Amenities Self Storage Tenants Will Pay Extra For