A guest blog spot by ISS Managing Editor, Drew Whitney.

Yesterday I received a phone call from a news reporter.

Over the years, weve received a number of calls from news reporters working on articles that focused on the self-storage phenomenon. In the early days, calls were few and far between. Typically reporters wanted to know statistics: Did we know how many facilities existed in a specific state or across the entire country? 

When REITs hit the scene, more newspapers called and delved into deeper statisticshow many facilities, where are they, who are the big players? Did we have any not tips or future forecasts?

Yesterdays call was different, though. It was from CNBC. Were doing a story on millionaires, the reporter divulged, further explaining that the focus would be on people who scraped together a bundle in businesses that often go unnoticed.

Having suffered a computer crash and resurrection last week during production cycle for our next magazine issue, I was undeniably pinched for time. I needed to steer this reporter to someone whod seen the business through many years and understand the challenges and great success stories someone who knew the industry inside and out someone who could answer anything that has anything to do with self-storage.

Why, it could be none other than our ISS Expo Prime Time Open Forum moderator, Jim Chiswell.

I gave Jim a call to see how it went. He spoke with the reporter for about 45 minutes, he said. She was very intrigued by his offerings and suggestions on how to further the story along. Certainly shed be following up with his leads and working them into an interesting piece.

And so, from storage sheds to self-storage conglomerates, weve all watched our industry survive and thrive, flourish into millionaire nests. It used to small-time snippets in newspapers that trumpeted storage success stories, and now were heading straight to primetime TV. Whats next? Troy Bix (our publisher) talking with Jay Leno? Teri Lanza being interviewed by Matt Lauer? Or how about this: Live With Jim and Kelly?

Only time and CNBC can tell for sure. Stay tuned!