Self Storage Units
San Francisco, California, USA
After doing more research then I care to admit, I finally got a self-storage unit here in San Francisco to store all my stuff while I'm traveling. Remember, this is a "self-storage" unit, not a "Public Storage" unit, since "Public Storage" is actually the name of a company that rents "self-storage" units. I guess when you ask a storage center if they have any "public storage" units available, that's a bit like asking for Whopper at McDonalds.
Apparently, the self-storage unit business is in even more dire needs for some website help then the backpack companies. The only information I want from a self-storage website is a) Where are you located? and b) What your rates are for each unit size. Bonus marks if you can tell me if you have anything available. I'm not interested in anything else, and frankly I don't care to call each place to find out what the rates are. If the rates are so volatile that they can't be posted on a website, then I'm not interested in doing business with them since I'll spend too much time thinking about how they just ripped me off. U-Haul and our friends at Public Storage get credit for having solid websites.
Even after all that complaining, I ended up renting from a local place that was just down the road from me. Self Storage 1 didn't include pricing information on their website, but they make up for it by being really close to my apartment, having a competent person on duty when I arrived and simply having the best value that I had come across yet. So in this case, value+location won out over website design, but that's really just because they were just down the street from me. Had they have been across town, I wouldn't have contacted them.
Kenny
After doing more research then I care to admit, I finally got a self-storage unit here in San Francisco to store all my stuff while I'm traveling. Remember, this is a "self-storage" unit, not a "Public Storage" unit, since "Public Storage" is actually the name of a company that rents "self-storage" units. I guess when you ask a storage center if they have any "public storage" units available, that's a bit like asking for Whopper at McDonalds.
Apparently, the self-storage unit business is in even more dire needs for some website help then the backpack companies. The only information I want from a self-storage website is a) Where are you located? and b) What your rates are for each unit size. Bonus marks if you can tell me if you have anything available. I'm not interested in anything else, and frankly I don't care to call each place to find out what the rates are. If the rates are so volatile that they can't be posted on a website, then I'm not interested in doing business with them since I'll spend too much time thinking about how they just ripped me off. U-Haul and our friends at Public Storage get credit for having solid websites.
Even after all that complaining, I ended up renting from a local place that was just down the road from me. Self Storage 1 didn't include pricing information on their website, but they make up for it by being really close to my apartment, having a competent person on duty when I arrived and simply having the best value that I had come across yet. So in this case, value+location won out over website design, but that's really just because they were just down the street from me. Had they have been across town, I wouldn't have contacted them.
Kenny
posted by Kenny Carruthers at 9/20/2005 08:11:00 PM
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