When you’re running a small business, self storage companies can offer you a real advantage, especially ones offering special rates or services on commercial storage. It can act as a starter warehouse for a retail business, as well as some advanced storage companies offering meeting rooms and web connectivity for people running their businesses directly out of them.

As with all things, it’s worth doing this well – putting in the time and effort to make sure your business storage is offering exactly what you need, and not costing you more (in money or time) than it really should. Let’s take a look at the different ways you can do that, so you can get started today.

The Right Location

If you’re using your storage for business, location becomes much more important. You need your storage to be somewhere you can readily access it without losing too much time. If it’s where you’re running your whole business from, that’s your daily commute. If it’s warehousing for your retail stock you could be visiting at least daily, maybe several times a day, to pick orders, deal with returns and take delivery of fresh stock – if it’s a long journey from where you’re doing the admin for your business, that’s a lot of time lost every day!

Shop around, get competing quotes, and use them to bargain down the price if the company in the right location is too expensive – it’s worth the time you put into this. The competition between storage companies is so fierce you can often secure a favourable price with the threat that you’ll go to a local competitor.

Getting Specific

Before you commit with a storage company, talk with them about your specific needs. Sometimes going with a generalist storage company isn’t the right solution, even if it’s cheaper: this is one of the false economies that business owners need to avoid.

If you’re selling something that requires specialist storage conditions, you need to make sure they’re available: if you’re selling wine, you need to be able to keep it a constant and appropriate temperature or you’ll have a lot of unhappy customers!

Efficient Packing

It’s vital that you pack your storage unit efficiently. You need to maximise the space on offer and also make sure you’re able to find what you need nice and quickly.

Start at the back with big items and boxes. Make sure everything is clearly labelled to ensure you know which of your several identical boxes has what you’re looking for. As you pack towards the front of your storage unit try to move down to smaller items but as you work, organise the unit so you can walk through to the back and side to side. Cross sectioning like this means that everything you need should be available within arms reach and picking stock will be easy!