Last week there were terrible storms all across the central and the southern states. Flying from St. Louis through Dallas to get to Las Vegas means when weather is bad in the central states, flights are delayed and cancelled and people often get only half way to where they want to go. Weather can sometimes cause problems for self storage too. If ice and snow are not removed promptly, people have a hard time accessing their units. Storms can cause roofs to leak. Even though self storage facilities do all they can to stay dry, big winds and hard rains can win out over a good roof.

What response strategies and new protocols do self storage owners use? Self storage owners are trying more self service strategies and are looking for ways to improve. But self storage is still very focused on new customer acquisition and is not paying much attention to current self storage customers, even though surveys will typically say that anywhere from 5 to 20 percent of renters come from referrals or previous customers.

Airlines are making better progress. Yes, they make a lot more money than self storage and airlines depend on repeat business. The airlines also realize that when travel plans go wacko, things can get very ugly for customers. One airline has added a very nice feature to its customer service and reservation system. You can enter your cell phone number into their system so when you call in, you are recognized and your itinerary is referenced without having to go though any steps. So while sitting on the runway hoping to take off, a traveler can easily call in to the reservation center and rebook connecting flights before even taking off. Although this does not cure weather delays, it does make the whole process of rebooking much easier and far less stressful. It makes getting to a self storage conference a lot easier. I realize most self storage operations do not have the capital to invest in this kind of infrastructure. But the cost of technology continues to drop as time goes by. Maybe we are not far away from a time when self storage companies can offer some very easy and very friendly ways for current customers to solve their problems.

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StorageMart Eola Rd & New York Aurora, IL 60504

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Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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We business men and women have the opportunity to decide our fate, to choose our goals and fulfill our dreams. What an amazing gift; we shouldn’t take it for granted as much as we, I know I, do.

Mr. Stein also went on to say, Working at the bottom level of a great company is better than owning a terrible company. Everyone gave a chuck as he said it, but it made me think. Mr. Stein showed an enthusiasm for all things self storage- wine storage, boat storage, yacht storage- and discussed the effect the Baby Boomer generation will have on the industry.

I can see a love for what they do in the smiles of the members, exhibitors, owners, sponsors, patrons and friendly people I met in the SSA. Although I had never met them in person, they welcomed us. They made this experience fun. So thanks to all my new friends!

Written by Sarah Little, TQA Account Executive

Thanks for reading our self storage blog. We offer call center, sales training management and secret shopping to the self storage industry.

Rent storage at 1100 North Point Rd, Baltimore, MD 21222

Are you moving to St. Paul, Minnesota? Visit our partners at St. Paul, Minnesota moving information center.

55343 Self Storage

Find Self Storage at your premier national and local self storage unit finder.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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I briefly stopped by the Canadian Storage Association’s reception and had the opportunity to meet and greet. The storage business there is not as saturated as it is in the U.S. and there is a lot of opportunity for growth there.

Then I attended an SSA Reception last night; it was great to finally put some faces to the voices I’ve talked to a hundred times. Just a few minutes after we were in the room, Ben Stein entered. He was absolutely friendly and came right over to us and shook our hands. (I should also mention that Natalie hugged him; she isn’t going to wash her shirt, ever.)

The agenda for today is a mixture of seminars, working in the booth on the trade show floor, networking and maybe a little luck.

I am thoroughly enjoying myself here. I wrote today’s blog as I sat near the picture window and watched the sun rise over the mountains. What a great industry self storage is; it offers so much potential and opportunity when you put your effort into it.

Written by Sarah Little, TQA Account Executive

Thanks for reading our self storage blog, a diary of life in the self storage industry.

66203 Self Storage

Rent storage at 3006 Druid Park Drive, Baltimore, MD 21215

Are you moving to Kansas City, Missouri? Visit our partners at Kansas City, Missouri moving information center.

Find Self Storage at your premier national and local self storage unit finder.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Later in the evening the self storage association will hold a dinner meeting for the affiliates. There are some interesting topic to discuss. How can the affiliates work together to create more interest in their areas and to do more to help members. There are always discussions in this group about how the SSA can help the affiliates and how the affiliates can help the SSA.

I hope to see you there.

Tron Jordheim PhoneSmart is your offsite sales force and Call Center in Columbia, Missouri. Thanks for visiting our self storage blog; the inside scoop into the self storage industry.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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O.k, I’ll be honest with you: when I first started out in the storage industry I thought that paying for storage was a little silly, even a bit excessive. However, due to my own experiences, my viewpoint has changed. Let me explain…

I used to live in a two-bedroom home with another person, my boyfriend. We broke up soon thereafter, and I found myself squeezing all that I was able to into a moderate sized studio apartment. I packed the closets from top to bottom and utilized the space around the apartment as well as I could. I placed plastic bins under the bed- everywhere- I even built a table using 8 boxes covered with a tablecloth. This took up A LOT of extra space, causing me to stumble around and bump my elbows and hips on hard corners throughout my house!

I thought about how nice it would be to glide throughout my house easily locating the belongings that are daily necessities. So I finally came to terms with my glaring need for storage. Packing up the stuff that I wanted to keep, but didn’t actually need at my apartment to put into storage was simply freeing. I felt like a huge burden had been lifted off of my shoulders as I lightened my load into a secure, fresh smelling storage unit. I am now a believer. My life is more structured with the excess gone and I no longer hit my funny bone on corners!

Property Management Blog The ins and outs of property management Secret Shopping Blog Your inside peek

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Welcome to the PhoneSmart blog, an inside look at self-storage.

Don’t forget the Inside Self Storage Expo in Reno, Tron Jordheim will be offering insights.
Inside Self Storage Expo in Reno See Tron Jordheim

PhoneSmart Your Offsite Sales Solution
Secret Shopping Blog Your inside peek
Self Storage Search Engine Self Storage in New York

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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20 Winners will receive 60 days of free roll-over sales support from the PhoneSmart Call center for one property.

1 Grand Prize winner will receive… FREE

1 year of PhoneSmart’s total sales solution for one property.

Includes:

Free call center roll-over service for one year

2 free secret shopping calls per month

4 free calls to the role-play helpline each month

1 Free sales training package for Self Storage

Free Leads from PhoneSmart’s lead generation program for one year

1 Free Ad tracking/ Call recording number from PhoneSmart’s Foster Accuracy for one year

Stop by Booth number 523 and enter during the trade show hours on March 30 and 31.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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And FREE PhoneSmart user forum

Coming to a location near you!

9 AM to 11 AM

9:00 to 9:45 “Sales 101 for Self Storage”.
We will share the PhoneSmart selling system so you can turn more of your rental inquiries into customers.

9:45 to 11:00 PhoneSmart User Forum.
Get the latest updates on PhoneSmart services. Share best practices. Get answers to all your questions. Find out how to make even more profit from your PhoneSmart services.

March and April Schedule…

March 28th Tuesday in downtown Chicago, IL

April 7th Friday in White Plains, Westchester, NY

April 18th Tuesday in downtown San Francisco, CA

April 20th Thursday in Los Angeles near LAX, CA

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Here is an opportunity to get some great sales training for free and to get to know more about PhoneSmart.

FREE “Sales 101 for Self Storage” Seminar

And FREE PhoneSmart user forum

Coming to a location near you!

9 AM to 11 AM

9:00 to 9:45 “Sales 101 for Self Storage”.
We will share the PhoneSmart selling system so you can turn more of your rental inquiries into customers.

9:45 to 11:00 PhoneSmart User Forum.
Get the latest updates on PhoneSmart services. Share best practices. Get answers to all your questions. Find out how to make even more profit from your PhoneSmart services.

March and April Schedule…

March 28th Tuesday in downtown Chicago, IL

April 7th Friday in White Plains, Westchester, NY

April 18th Tuesday in downtown San Francisco, CA

April 20th Thursday in Los Angeles near LAX, CA

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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There are lots of preparations going on in the industry to get ready for the big Inside Self Storage conference next week in Lost Wages. I hope you get a chance to come for it. I will be involved in several great sessions, “Maximizing Profits” and “Selling Self Storage”

Of course you can come by the PhoneSmart booth during the trade show portion and see what is new with us. If you mention this blog, you can get a free purple PhoneSmart shirt. It is pretty nice and worth the effort.

We will be there talking about our sales support services. If you are not using us currently, you owe it to yourself to find out more. If you are a client, changes are you are not using us to your full advantage.

See you in Vegas, baby!

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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This is helpful in anticipating and forecasting staffing needs, revenue generation and inventory needs. It will also help you see if you are on track. By noticing an above or below forecast day or week, you can reexamine your business to see if there is a problem or condition in your market, a problem in your business practice or maybe just an error in forecasting.

As our self storage industry gets more competitive and demands that we invest more money, it becomes increasingly important to know more and more about it.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Hi,

If you are a current PhoneSmart customer and would like to spend two hours in our trade show booth at the Inside Self Storage Convention March 2nd and 3rd at The Mandalay Bay Resort, let me know. I will get you a comp full conference registration and help you with travel expenses and take you to dinner. All you need to do is to tell people visiting our booth about your PhoneSmart experience. You will be a testimonial giver! Heck of a deal!

This will be a good conference and you should try to go if you can.

If you are… or if you are not a PhoneSmart customer, here is how you can win a cool prize:

Come to the PhoneSmart booth on Friday the 3rd during the regular trade show hours and mention how you heard about this offer. Then give us 1 minute of your time and your business card. In return you can choose from one of the following prizes:

1- a “Creating a Sales Culture” Audio CD by Tron Jordheim
2- a $5.00 gaming chip for the Mandalay Bay casino

Nice, huh?

(this offer is only good on Friday!)

We will be in booth #525. Make sure to ask about special trade show offers for current and new customers.

If you are a current customer, we will have special offers for you that you don’t want to miss.

New customers will have several great opportunities to start using us to make more profit. We know that if you do business with us, you will want to be our client for a long time, because we are a very profitable partner to have.

You will also want to attend these sessions I will be a part of:

Wednesday March 1 at 3:30 pm, I will be on a panel called “Maximizing Profits”. We will talk about how using a call center, offering tenant insurance, selling locks and boxes and having rental trucks can add lots of dollars to your bottom line, especially when your people are trained to sell.

Thursday March 2nd at 10:00 am I will be doing my popular “Selling Self Storage” seminar. It will be an abbreviated version designed to give you some great selling techniques to take home… so you can rent more units.

Friday March 3rd at 10:00 am PhoneSmart will be doing a special vendor presentation. If you know something about us, you will want to come to look at our new service offerings, designed to help you rent even more units. If you don’t know much about us, you will want to see how our sales solutions can make your self storage business even more profitable and more successful.

Don’t forget to come by our booth on Friday and mention the free prize.

See you in Las Vegas!

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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The ISS self storage convention in Miami started today. It looked like the best attended session was with Jim Chiswell. He always draws a crowd. I think it is because he is good at hammering home the main points he has been stressing for a long time…and he always comes up with a few new and interesting things to talk about. He seems to constantly rethink his “stump” speech, always trying to make it more relevant. He is also not afraid to learn. He brings new experiences and new insights to each of these events.

Tomorrow I am doing one of my “Stump” speeches. It is my “Sales 101” geared to self storage. We are calling the session “Winning Sales Strategies”, because that is what the whole “Sales 101” concept is all about. Get a good game plan. Get a good play book. Keep practicing and then get out there and play your game to the best of your ability. Your customers and potential customers will not always cooperate, but very few opportunities will get by you without you being able to put some points on the board.

I’ll let you know how it goes.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Today the Miami ISS show is getting started. I hope lots of people turn out. Miami is an interesting place to go. It is where the U.S. meets the Caribbean. It is where New York meets the South. It is where English meets Spanish and Creole. It is also an interesting self storage market. There are quite a few operators who do well here. Miami is a thriving metropolis with lots of people moving and buying and selling homes.

One session I am interested in attending later is about the future of urban storage. We assume that urban areas are good for our business. I’ll be curious to see what trends are expected impact the urban operators.

I’ll also be setting up the trade show booth for PhoneSmart. That is a ritual that allows the vendors to meet and greet each other and see who is doing anything new. It should be enjoyable.

Bye for now, Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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The Inside Self Storage Expo and Conference will be Tuesday November 29 through Friday the 2nd of December in Miami.

There will be some excellent seminars, including a session I will lead, called “Winning Sales Strategies”. The seminar will be at 8:00 am for you early risers on Wednesday the 30th of November.

You can also visit with lots of vendors who help you make your business work, including me!

I will be giving a special Vendor Presentation on PhoneSmart services on Friday the 1st of December at 10:00am. Even if you are one of our many happy clients, you should attend this session and find out about some of our other valuable services…all designed to help you make more profit.

The roundtable discussions are always a favorite of the ISS Expos. Stop by my table to talk about using Call Centers effectively and make sure to sit in for some of the other great topics.

If you will be in Miami and attend my seminar, the PhoneSmart vendor presentation or my roundtable, mention the self storage blog and I will give you an extra special prize that will help your business!

Go to www.insideselfstorage.com/expo/miami and register.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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As you know, South Florida had a bit of inclement weather a few weeks back. Hurricane Wilma blew through in a hurry causing a lot more inconvenience than destruction. My brother’s mother-in-law lives in the area Wilma visited. She said in her immediate neighborhood there were quite a few trees that went down, but not much building damage. She was quite annoyed that her favorite trees near her condo were uprooted. But the tree she really hates, that blocks the view out of her living room, survived with hardly a leaf lost. That is the fickle nature of storms, isn’t it?

One inconvenience Wilma cause was to disrupt the Self Storage trade show schedule. The Inside Self Storage Expo had to be postponed. However in true Florida style, it wouldn’t take but four weeks to get ready to go back to normal. So if you had planned to go to the Fall ISS show, come on. If you hadn’t originally planned to go, check your schedule and make it happen. The Expo and Conference will be Tuesday November 29 through Friday the 2nd of December.

There will be some excellent seminars, including a session I will lead, called “Winning Sales Strategies”. The seminar will be at 8:00 am for you early risers on Wednesday the 30th of November.

You can also visit with lots of vendors who help you make your business work, including me! I will be giving a special Vendor Presentation on PhoneSmart services on Friday the 1st of December at 10:00am. Even if you are one of our many happy clients, you should attend this session and find out about some of our other valuable services…all designed to help you make more profit.

The roundtable discussions are always a favorite of the ISS Expos. Stop by my table to talk about using Call Centers effectively and make sure to sit in for some of the other great topics.

One session topic you shouldn’t miss will be “Disaster Recovery”, lead by the Nunez brothers of Southern Florida. They have had some practice in this subject over the years and can give you some great tips.

Miami is very nice this time of year, even after hurricane clean-up.. The host hotel, the Hyatt Regency, has a great rate of only $139.00 a night. That is not bad at all.

I don’t know how air fares are where you fly from, but my flight from St. Louis will only be under $250.00. That’s not much more than a few tanks of gas these days.

I’m not sure you can afford to miss this show. The cost will be pretty low and the learning and networking will be very valuable.

Go to www.insideselfstorage.com/expo/miami and register.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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As you know, South Florida had a bit of inclement weather a few weeks back. Hurricane Wilma blew through in a hurry causing a lot more inconvenience than destruction. My brother’s mother-in-law lives in the area Wilma visited. She said in her immediate neighborhood there were quite a few trees that went down, but not much building damage. She was quite annoyed that her favorite trees near her condo were uprooted. But the tree she really hates, that blocks the view out of her living room, survived with hardly a leaf lost. That is the fickle nature of storms, isn’t it?

One inconvenience Wilma cause was to disrupt the Self Storage trade show schedule. The Inside Self Storage Expo had to be postponed. However in true Florida style, it wouldn’t take but four weeks to get ready to go back to normal. So if you had planned to go to the Fall ISS show, come on. If you hadn’t originally planned to go, check your schedule and make it happen. The Expo and Conference will be Tuesday November 29 through Friday the 2nd of December.

There will be some excellent seminars, including a session I will lead, called “Winning Sales Strategies”. The seminar will be at 8:00 am for you early risers on Wednesday the 30th of November.

You can also visit with lots of vendors who help you make your business work, including me! I will be giving a special Vendor Presentation on PhoneSmart services on Friday the 1st of December at 10:00am. Even if you are one of our many happy clients, you should attend this session and find out about some of our other valuable services…all designed to help you make more profit.

The roundtable discussions are always a favorite of the ISS Expos. Stop by my table to talk about using Call Centers effectively and make sure to sit in for some of the other great topics.

One session topic you shouldn’t miss will be “Disaster Recovery”, lead by the Nunez brothers of Southern Florida. They have had some practice in this subject over the years and can give you some great tips.

Miami is very nice this time of year, even after hurricane clean-up.. The host hotel, the Hyatt Regency, has a great rate of only $139.00 a night. That is not bad at all.

I don’t know how air fares are where you fly from, but my flight from St. Louis will only be under $250.00. That’s not much more than a few tanks of gas these days.

I’m not sure you can afford to miss this show. The cost will be pretty low and the learning and networking will be very valuable.

Go to www.insideselfstorage.com/expo/miami and register.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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You may have heard that South Florida had a bit of weather over the last few days. This means the Inside Self Storage Expo and Conference will be postponed. So don’t go to Miami tomorrow, thinking you can come to my sales seminar or vendor presentation. As soon as a new date has been set, you’ll find out. Hopefully you will be able to make it.

Yesterday was a good day for calls and reservations. We had hoped the last full week of October would be good as it typically has been. Lots of PhoneSmart reps did well with reservations yesterday, which means your stores should have good move-in activity this week and this weekend.

Houses are still selling. This is good. That means people still need to store to get their homes staged, their moving pre-organized, and their move finalized. I sometimes like to read other people’s blogs on related subjects. You should take a look at Jason Nowlin’s real estate blog at: http://www.jasonnowlin.com/blog/

Jason is an up and coming real estate agent in Central Missouri and has some good perspective on the residential housing market. In many respects, the residential housing market fuels the self storage market. So it wouldn’t be a bad idea to look at trends and forecasts that Jason refers to.

Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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There were about 200 people attending the CA SSA meet in Sna Francisco. I had the pleasure to lead a seminar yesterday on maximizing profits. We talked about plugging the holes in your “prospect buckets” and finding ways to create and track more leads. It is in many ways a trial and error process. We had an interesting discussion and swapped some good ideas.

Then I had a chance to visit with some of our clients and with people who we hope will become our new customers. I foud that many peopl eare looking for help with their total sales program. Hey, that’s the direction we are going in , too. So it should be a good match.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Today I am in San Francisco for the California State Self Storage convention. I will be presenting a program tomorrow on maximizing profit in your storage facilities. I noticed three or four storage places on the way into town from the airport.

I would bet that if California were its own country, it would be the second best nation for self storage in the world. That means California operators are leaving a lot of money on the table if they are not trying to maximize profits at their stores.

I’ll give you my impressions of the meeting as things get going.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Are you going to San Francisco?

If you are involved in California’s self storage business in any way, you need to be in San Francisco next week at the CA state storage association annual meeting and convention.

There will be some great presentations. You will get to meet the most active vendors for the state and you’ll get to see me!

I will be doing a seminar session called “Maximizing Profits”. I’ll talk about strategies and tactics you can use to send as many dollars to your bottom line as you can. My assumption is that the “real” money in self storage is made in the last 10% of occupancy you gain: the spread between 80% occupied and 90%. Here is where you are working on pushing profit to the bottom line rather than just gaining occupancy. If the methods you use to fill in this profitable 10% are all paying for themselves in revenue gains, you are doing the right things.

Join us in San Francisco. For details go to http://cssaweb.com.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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I hope to see you in Miami in a few weeks at the Inside Self Storage conference. I will be doing a seminar on sales strategies that will help you rent more units. This Fall Florida conference is a good one. There will be many good sessions to attend and there will be time to visit with vendors on the show floor.

I think you will find some valuable tools and tactics to bring home from my seminar. One of the great benefits we gain at PhoneSmart is the laboratory effect. We are studying the industry on a day to day basis. Since we are a sales organization, we are also studying selling skills every day. I will share some of the knowledge we absorb each day and put it into a simple system you can take home and plug into your system. Presto…more rentals.

As an example, we picked up on the effect the higher cost of gasoline was having on shopping habits before the story even hit the news. We developed sales strategies to help people save gasoline by choosing the store we answered for.

Look for me in Miami.

Bye for now, Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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I am getting my head back on after being in Las Vegas at the Self Storage Association meeting. We got to talk to lots of clients, acquaintances and future clients. There were about 2,500 people in attendance from all over the place.

I had the honor of leading two roundtable discussions. One was about how storage operators are using call centers to rent more units. The other was on how consumer demand cycles through the times of day, days of week, weeks and months of the different seasons. Both sessions were well attended and sparked a lot of great conversation.

I also enjoyed the panel presentations and guest speakers. Carol Shipley from United Stor All spoke at the opening session about her view of the next 30 years in self storage. She was kind enough to let us publish her notes. You will find them in today’s property management blog. Look to the side bar that gives you a link to property management and check out the blog today.

I have been going to these self storage meetings for 5 years and each one gets bigger and better. It is interesting to see the industry develop. It is also interesting to see that as the REITs and large operators continue to prosper, the small operator continues to do well, too. More stores are being built and improved by the 2 to 10 store sized company than all the REITs combined. Will this trend continue? GE did not fare well with its attempt to conquer and consolidate the storage business. Let’s see how the other players handle themselves.

bye for now, Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Afterwards a panel talked about waht might be coming in the years ahead. . Here is an interestin statistic. 51% of respondends to a self storage use survey had not used self storage but were familiar with it. That is a ton of prospects.

A suggestion was made that we may become moving and storage logistics coordinators one day. Our abilitity to put all the pieces together for someone moving might really change how we operate.

We shall see waht becomes of the self storage industry.

bye for now, Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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If you are heading to Las Vegas to the Self storage association conference in a couple of weeks, be sure to attend the roundtable discussions. there are always some great topics and some neat people to meet.

I will be leading two roundtables. One will be on Call Centers: How storage owners are using different business models to make the best of their missed phone calls.

I have a special offer that should make it interesting for you. PhoneSmart is offering one paid full registration and a night out to dinner for one lucky winner. We will select a winner at random from anyone who can name three different people who have posted submissions to the self storage blog over the last several months.

Just look through the archives and pick out the names of three people who have submitted items and email the names to me at Tron@phone-smart.net. The deadline for entries is August 17th. If you are selected the winner and you have not registered yet for the conference, we will buy your registration. If you win and have already registered, we will reimburse you for it. And we will treat you to dinner. There will be two dinner times available for you to choose: Wednesdays or Thursday at 8:00 pm in one of the restaurants in Caesar’s. You can transfer your prize to someone else if you won’t be able to use it.

So don’t delay. Look through the archives and submit the three names to me soon.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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There will de discussions of self storage on military bases. This is a sore issue for those of us who have locations near military outposts.

You will get a chance to see the on-line demand estimator that can give you some idea of how demographics of a particular area will translate into demand. This should be interesting.

And of course you will have a chance to see the PhoneSmart crew in our booth.

I have a special offer that should make it interesting for you. PhoneSmart is offering one paid full registration and a night out to dinner for one lucky winner. We will select a winner at random from anyone who can name three different people who have posted submissions to the self storage blog over the last several months.

Just look through the archives and pick out the names of three people who have submitted items and email the names to me at Tron@phone-smart.net. The deadline for entries is August 17th. If you are selected the winner and you have not registered yet for the conference, we will buy your registration. If you win and have already registered, we will reimburse you for it. And we will treat you to dinner. There will be two dinner times available for you to choose: Wednesdays or Thursday at 8:00 pm in one of the restaurants in Caesar’s. You can transfer your prize to someone else if you won’t be able to use it.

So don’t delay. Look through the archives and submit the three names to me soon.

bye for now,
Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Today I attended a meeting of the self storage association of New Jersey. The association is managed by Chris McGrath and his staff of professional association managers. I noticed several things about the group in attendance. Many I have know for several years. There were larger operators and smaller operators. But they are all successful and they are all doing well in their businesses. Is this a chicken and egg sort of thing, you ask yourself? Are they successful because they are active in supporting the association and active in benefiting from the association’s work? Or do successful people support trade associations and unsuccessful people don’t. I think they are successful because they have a good association. In the brief meeting today, there was an excellent module on protecting information we receive from credit reports and other sensitive customer data. There was a review and update on the service members relief act, which could impact many of you. There was a good review of marketing strategies. Several vendors had a chance to talk about their busineses. I found a few of them to be very educational. Nick Malagisi, the self storage broker, talked about some criteria for rating a facility as “Institutional grade”. He raised some good points for stepping back and taking a look at your facility or others. John Gilliland from Real Estate Investment Management talked about how owners can make sure their facilities are being managed correclty by hiring a professional management firm. Why should an owner worry about his investment? Tom Garden from Syrasoft raised some great ideas talking about a new module his staff created to manage automobile and titled vehicle storage.

If you are not active with your local state group, you need to be.

bye for now,
Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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Yesterday’s meeting of the CA self storage association was all about financing. It was interesting to see a comparison between loan activity in 04 and 05. Lenders are getting much more creative with how they make a loan happen. More storage owners are taking a closer look at their options before choosing a loan. And based on the number of 10 year loans about to mature, there appears to be a big re-fi boom in the wings. You are also seeing more interest-only loans and more loans with stair-stepping prepayment penalties. Both are indicators that owners plan to sell or re-finance again soon.

It will be interesting to see what happens when interest rates begin to rise again, as they surely will at some point. Will that put some owners in a negative cash-flow position? When you are talking about the kind of money it takes to make a storage project work, an increase of a point or two in interest changes the game.In the mean time, we will keep trying to help owners gain occcupancy and revenue, so their long term options become attractive.

bye for now,
Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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I didn’t get a chance to put in an entry yesterday, as I was travelling. I am in Orange County California for a meeting of the California Self Storage Association. PhoneSmart is a co-sponsor and we hope to talk to lots of clients and maybe gain a few new clients in the process. Our sponsorship involves a few fun things. There will be a very special, very California prize that will be raffled off at today’s meeting. I can’t tell you what it is yet. I was sworn to secrecy, so as to not devulge the nature of a new campaign the California association is starting to gain more awareness from non-members and more participation from members. The state associations play a very important role in helping our businesses and they need support and participation. So go help your local state association.

The other prize at today’s meeting will be a PhoneSmart night at Dodger stadium for the first game after the All-Star break. It will be Dodgers vs. Giants for a fun north-south rivalry game. So I have been thinking baseball lately.

Yesterday our calls at PhoneSmart were in the strike zone and there were a lot of pitches being thrown. We actually saw more calls than we had forecasted, as this week of July is generally a little bit slow as people are gearing up for end of the month moving a nd cleaning projects. So this was a good sign. When the calls are busy, we are making money for our clients and for ourselves. And we are helping people who need storage find a great place to store with as little stress as possible. We are in the perfect win-win-win situation.

I’ll let you know how California is doing in my next entry.

bye for now,
Tron

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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If you are responsible for keeping your properties rented up, you’ll want to come and have lunch with me in Orange County California on July 12th. I will be hosting a lunch at 11:30 AM at the Balboa Bay Club. Seating is very limited. So RSVP ASAP.

I will be sharing some success stories from our clients. The internal upside in your property is in your phone calls. You can rent to more of the people that are already calling you.

Thanks,
Tron

Thanks for reading the self storage blog.

Disclamer: This entry is intended to promote our partner StorageMart and some or all participants received compensation.

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