November 22, 2019

Self-storage – digitization changes an industry

STORE ROOM Lagerabteile Selfstorage

About 200 years ago, the industrial revolution turned the world upside down. Technological progress led to a fundamental change in the economy and society, resulting in an irrevocable break with old habits, ways of working and patterns of thinking. Having arrived in the 21st century, digitization is seamlessly integrated into this historical process of technological revolutions, and it is not one whit inferior to industrialization in terms of radicality and potential for change.

On the contrary. If scientists, entrepreneurs and other opinion leaders are to be believed, the Industrial Revolution was merely a harbinger of the substantial upheavals that will accompany the transition from the analog to the digital age. It should be said, however, that digitization is still in its infancy. New technological applications such as artificial intelligence are only beginning to unleash their full potential and offer us just a taste of the change that lies ahead in the coming decades. Nevertheless, digitization has arrived in almost all areas of life and is already leading to drastic changes. So too in the self-storage industry. The following lines will explain in more detail what specific advantages this offers customers.

Analog storage

It is the year 2008 and Theresa is about to make her long awaited move . She is to go to Japan for a year to set up her employer’s new branch there. Before it can get started, however, she has one more problem to solve. The accommodation of all her belongings, since she had to give up her beloved apartment due to the stay abroad.

From a friend she learns that in a peripheral district of Vienna there are storage compartments for rent where she could store her furniture and other items
and other items that would not make it on the trip. Unfortunately, a brief search on the Internet did not yield any more specific results, so she rummaged through the phone book to locate the company in question. After searching for several minutes, she finally found what she was looking for; unfortunately, the line at the other end was not busy. Well, it was also 1:00 pm and the employees probably on lunch break.

Hours later, Theresa finally managed to get someone on the phone. A friendly but bored voice by Viennese standards explained the details to her: opening hours are Monday to Friday between 08:00 and 18:00. Storage compartments are available in the categories “Small”, “Medium” and “Large”. Theresa should rent a trailer and bring her belongings.

Happy to have finally found a place for her belongings, Theresa took a day off two weeks later to finally get its placement behind her. At least her boyfriend and long-term student Thomas had time to help her load her things into the rented van. After laborious lugging, Theresa finally arrived at her destination, however, to find that only storage compartments in the category “Large” with 30m² were available. The rest have already been booked out in the meantime. Although her belongings took up only half of the space, whereas a compartment of the category “medium” would have been more or less suitable, she decided to accommodate her things anyway for lack of alternatives. After all, she would be well paid for her stay abroad, so she could cope with the unnecessary additional costs.

After Theresa had filled out half a dozen forms with information about herself and her items to be stored, she was finally assigned her storage compartment and handed the corresponding lock and key. After another hour spent putting her possessions away, Theresa, exhausted but relieved, finally closed the door to her half-empty compartment . It wasn’t easy, she thought to herself, but at least her adventure on the other side of the world can finally begin.

Digital storage

We write the year 2019 and Georg looks proudly at the 30 or so clay jugs and vases he had painstakingly pottered over the past few weeks and slowly begin to take over in his small Vienna municipal apartment. After he had already showered his circle of relatives and acquaintances with plenty of homemade gifts, but the sale of his pottery works of art had not really taken off, he decided he had to do something about his lack of space. Cellar compartment Unfortunately, he doesn’t have one, and quitting pottery wouldn’t be an option. There must be another solution.

Georg sits down at his computer and types “Storage Vienna“into his search bar, whereupon the search engine promptly lists dozens of self-storage providers in and around Vienna. Somewhat overwhelmed by the large selection, he decides to simply choose the first provider and, in less than a minute of searching, lands on the website of STORE ROOM. That was quick, Georg noted with relief.

Two clicks later, Georg already has the entire assortment in front of his eyes. Storage compartments in all different sizes and price categories. Unsure of the many options, he sees the possibility of having the right size calculated for his storage compartment. He would need to accommodate about 10 larger boxes to have enough space for his pottery for the foreseeable future. In a few simple steps, it adds 10 boxes of the right size to the square meter calculator and a fraction of a second later receives the correct warehouse size.

Since the financial means of a freelance artist artist are not endless, Georg notes with great relief that according to the calculator the cheapest 1m² compartment already offers enough space for his boxes. With a few more clicks, Georg has already arrived at the payment. Even bubble wrap for protection of the pots and the 10 required boxes can be added to the shopping cart in the same step. Just enter the invoice details and Georg is the proud owner of a storage compartment ten minutes after opening his Internet browser. Even the Transporter to store his art objects is included at no extra charge due to the six-month advance payment. Georg would not have expected it to happen so quickly.

In addition, Georg learns that STORE ROOM also has an app for his smartphone. This allows him to have constant access to his belongings and to be able to store or retrieve them around the clock. The cell phone acts as a digital door opener to his belongings. By the way, if you find yourself in a similar situation as Georg, and want to store goods for sale, we have here provided a few useful tips for them.

Opportunities and risks of digitalization

Comparing the two scenarios just described, with only a decade between them, the differences are striking. Whereas storing in the traditional (analog) way involved a lot of hassle and uncertainty, doing it digitally is not much more complicated than having a pizza delivered to your home. However, for all the simplicity and benefits gained, there are also risks and hurdles associated with digitization in the self-storage industry.

There is above all the aspect of security which affects just about every area in a digital world, but is particularly true of self-storage. If his entire stored belongings can be accessed at any time via an app, it must of course be ensured under all circumstances that people with bad intentions cannot gain access to customers’ user profiles. Data protection is therefore a top priority and requires providers to keep up to date with the latest security technology.

It should also be noted that certain groups of people may have difficulty keeping up with digitization. For a young and urban audience, digital self-storage is a boon; for older people, who may not even have a smartphone, it may be a hindrance. What is needed here, of course, are approaches that enable even less tech-savvy people to become familiar with new technological possibilities, such as digital warehousing.

If we take another look at what has been made possible in the last 10 years through technological progress in the field of digitization, it is just as exciting to look ahead. As you may have gathered from news or tech blogs, Amazon is starting to use drones to deliver packages in the near future (read here). This kind of mobility could also lead to significant changes in the self-storage industry, if not only renting a storage compartment but also storing it becomes child’s play. Imagine your moving boxes are picked up by a digitally networked aircraft right outside your front door or delivered there in minutes whenever you need them.

Digitization is changing all of our lives and this also applies to the self-storage industry to the self-storage industry as well. We hope to have given you an interesting insight into the way in which self-storage is also subject to the changing times, and what advantages you, above all, can derive from it.

Your STORE ROOM Team 🤖

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You don’t know exactly how much storage space you need, how renting our selfstorage space works or you have other questions? We are happy to assist you!

You would like to visit our storage facilities before renting to get an idea on site? Then book an appointment right here!

You are welcome to send us a message via our contact form, send us an email directly, or even send us a message via WHATSAPP:

Of course you can also call us:

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