Facility Management

This is going to come as a shock to some owners, district managers and corporate officers: You are not the most important person in your business. That distinction clearly belongs to the facility manager. There are few businesses as manager-centric as self-storage. In many cases, multi-million dollar assets are in the hands of only one or two people, and their ...

I know this is something that’s only talked about in whispers. It’s a subject that’s hard to bring up, even with the people you know. I’m talking, of course, about Education Dysfunction, or E.D. E.D. is a condition sometimes brought on by a difficult budget or simple neglect. It’s defined by most professionals as delusional thinking that “you already know ...

When an industry is in growth mode, the emphasis is on increasing capacity, margins and market share. But when demand fades, the emphasis must turn to creating more efficient management processes and tools. This is where we are in the self-storage industry right now. Every owner is looking for ways to manage his business more efficiently, effectively and creatively without ...

The self-storage industry has the ability to attract and retain some excellent property managers. They love the autonomy, great hours and responsibility provided to them while running a multi-million-dollar business almost on their own. Luckily, most of the great managers we find stick around. However, we’ve all heard the horror stories—and many of us have experienced them—about the self-storage owner ...

As we leave the dynamic storage market of 2009, it’s time to review the items we can successfully change in 2010. It may be time to evaluate and update your facility’s curb appeal, marketing plan or payroll. It may be time to approve a capital repair you didn’t complete last year or institute a new policy or procedure left for ...