259. Turning Apartment Storage Lockers into Full-Blown “Micro” Storage Facilities w/Alex Harman and Peter Smyth

These two business school graduates may have cracked the code for self storage in big cities. By converting apartment tenant storage lockers into full-blown “micro” self storage facilities, tenants renting tiny units can easily walk a couple of blocks to store their bulkier items, WITHOUT paying the premium of storing at one of the big REITs much farther away. This duo has been so successful that they’ve scaled to sixty locations fast, and they’re not stopping anytime soon. Alex Harman and Peter Smyth, founders of Local Locker and White Label Storage, realized how profitable self storage could be when they were in business school. The problem? Like most students, they had very little money to go out and buy a self storage facility. After struggling to find convenient storage in their own market (New York City), they wondered if they could turn apartment basements into “micro” facilities for tenants like them. They threw together a rough and ready prototype facility, and…it worked! Now, with sixty facilities under the Local Locker brand and another sixty or so being managed by their team, they’ve tapped into the true success of small self storage. Today, I’m talking to them about how they started, the tech stack they use to run these “micro” facilities,” the operational problems they’ve had to solve, and why tiny storage units are crucial for dense cities.    What you’ll learn in today’s show:   How “micro” self storage could be taking over dense cities with limited space Scaling your self storage portfolio fast and why having the right tech is crucial  Systematizing your self storage operations, even if you’re a small facility  Why running a self storage facility yourself is rarely a good idea  Self storage “rules” you must follow to avoid troublesome tenants  Why many apartment tenants DON’T want to rent a unit from a REIT — Local Locker White Label Storage