Today, we would like to tell you about storage. Not cloud storage, but instead about the self storage industry. You see, our goal at STOW IT is to change the way storage is currently operated. We focus on customer service and allow individuals to rent their own, unused space for storage. To fully understand how we are revolutionizing the self storage industry, we must take a trip back in time to when it all began.

The First Entrants

While there are loosely documented storage businesses in ancient times, the first known record of modern day storage was started in Omaha, NE by brothers Martin and John Bekins. They founded the appropriately named Bekins Company in 1895. They expanded into a few cities, but it wasn’t until the 1950’s when storage became a popular business nationwide.

In 1958, Lauderdale Storage was started in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. By 1960 there were several storage chains starting to emerge. Not only new entrants, but companies like U-Haul that had been founded in the 1940’s started offering storage to their clients. By the 1970’s massive storage chains started growing throughout the United States. Public Storage, was founded in 1972 and became one of the first storage companies to be funded by a real estate investment trust. This proved to be an effective model and was quickly copied. Soon Extra Space Storage followed suit and the race for market share began. Once this model was proven, self storage started to grow in the United States.

Current Day

Over the next 30 years, storage grew to a $25 billion-dollar annual industry in the United States. Public Storage remained and still remains the only industry incumbent with more than a 5% market share. During the last 10 years, the Self-Storage Industry has continued growth regardless of economic conditions. It is now a $35 billion-dollar formal industry with thousands of market participants. The self-storage industry is one of the most fragmented industries in this country. In addition to the formal storage industry, the informal and undeclared storage industry is approximately a $10 billion-dollar industry.

While storage has grown rapidly in the United States, it seems to just be getting started in many first-world countries. For example, there are only about 4,000 storage facilities in all of Europe, while there are over 52,000 facilities in the United States. The fastest growth is coming in places with rapidly growing populations and rising income such as China and Australia.

In addition to the number of units growing, the demand is growing just as fast. As of 2014, 90% of storage units across the United States were occupied. This has led to the rapid development of more facilities.

The Future of Self Storage

We believe that individual garages will be the storage unit of the future.

At STOW IT, we believe that we don’t need to build more storage units in the United States. We have hundreds of thousands of unused garages, barns, and acres of land. We also have millions of individuals in this country looking to make passive income. At STOW IT we combine the extra space, passive income, and cost savings through our peer-to-peer solution. Our goal is to offer more vehicle, boat, RV, and trailer storage spaces than any other company in the world within 5 years, and we believe that we are on pace and will accomplish our goal.

Thanks for reading and please check out our product at www.stowit.com. Don’t forget to join the conversation on our telegram channel and download our newest Whitepaper at www.stowittoken.com.