The storage industry is one of the fastest growing business practices in the US, tallying $39 billion market annually. If one is looking for to break into this growing business niche, a franchise can be a great option to start with. Committed to Quality, Storage Authority LLC, is the only nationally recognized franchising opportunity for self-storage in the United States. It provides a self-storage facility, merging good old fashion services with the best technology to provide 100% satisfaction guarantee and the reassurance to its clients.

The company strives to make its franchise owners’ experience as seamless and easy as possible. It has created a “turn-key” business model to provide the high end “Ritz customer service” for very happy customers to help franchise owners successfully harness the potential of owning SELF STORAGE.

The Franchise Universe caught up with Marc Goodin, the CEO of Storage Authority, to shed light on the company’s franchise model, values, and its commitment to support emerging business leaders.

“Storage Authority helps busy professionals build a six figure income while they continue their careers.”

Below are the highlights of the interview:

What led to the inception of Storage Authority LLC?

I was contacted by Scott House, a hotel franchise expert, who wanted one on one assistance to build his first self-storage. He had read all the books and taken several classes but understood it take more than that to build a multimillion dollar business. I had retired 15 years early and done five years of fishing and was ready to get back to work so I agreed to help him. After a couple of weeks he said self-storage would be a great franchise business for self-storage owners given all the experience it takes to develop and operate a self-storage. And soon after we co-founded Storage Authority, the only self-storage franchise in the US, things moved along swiftly and Storage Authority quickly became full time for both of us. But, since Scott did not own a self-storage he could not afford to work for free so he gave up his ownership and became a franchisee instead. His 80,000 square feet facility Storage Authority Mulberry, FL has been opened for 2 years and is for sale for $14,100,000 and he is expected to close soon for a several million dollar profit. A true success story!

Give a brief overview of your background and your role at Storage Authority LLC.

I am a civil engineer by trade and owned a civil engineering company in CT. I designed residential and commercial developments including many selfstorages for others. After noticing the self-storage developers were the only developers not going back to work after our meetings I designed, and built 2 self-storages in 2007 & 2009 that I still own and manage. More recently I built my first international facility in Canada.

As the CEO and as a team we are constantly reviewing and improving our 3 major platforms consisting of 1) Development, 2) Operations and 3) Sales & Marketing. I enjoy finding innovating ways of improving all three platforms to help our franchisee make oversized profits. I love new development and of course have years of expertise and learning from the trenches so I spend a good deal of time helping new franchisee during the development phase. Franchisees owners are our number one priority so my personal cell phone is available to every franchise owner.

Describe the company and its Self-Storage business model which address all the needs of your customers.

Storage Authority helps busy professionals make an extra 6 figure self-storage profit and retirement nest egg, while they continue your career.

Specifically we:

1) Make self-storage MUCH, MUCH easier and reduce the risks for our franchisees

2) Help our Franchisees obtain oversized profits and other benefits most people would never reach on their own.

3) Help our franchisees to have a lifestyle and growth business that allows them to retire early if they choose to.

We do this by providing a personalized Road Map for each franchise owner using our 3 Tier Platform consisting various systems, Dynamic Ease Manuals and one on one guidance for each platform. They include

• New Development: The Storage Authority Dynamic Ease Development Platform includes planning, finding land, feasibility review, design, obtain approvals and build or buy your selfstorage.
• Operations: The Storage Authority Dynamic Ease Operational Platform consist of a very efficient high tech & high touch manager, website & kiosk driven self-storage facility.
• Sales, Marketing and Customer Service: The Storage Authority Dynamic Ease Sales and Marketing platform insures a premium Storage Authority Brand for extra profits most owners could never make on their own.

Describe in detail about the work culture and the values that drive your Value-Added Services.

We provide a manager driven system where the manager is the highest common denominator, unlike the REITS who’s managers are the least common denominator. This provides for exceptional efficiencies and more rentals at higher rates. Managers and owner are not only provided operational training but also customer service, sales and marketing training to run a premier facility. To meet the demands of different customer types we incorporate both high touch and high tech to reach and connect with clients based upon their wants, needs and preferences.

As a well-known company in the Self-Storage Development, what advance technologies are you leveraging to make your solutions more productive and approachable?

We start by sharing several methods on how to find land offline. We find over 50 percent of our land or facility purchases offline. We use several apps from google nearby, google maps, and others to look at a property and the surrounding areas and the competition. There are multiple apps to review the size and rates of the competition and to determine the population.

Once a facility is open we use a variety of high tech and high touch options to provide our customers with over the top service. These includes simple thing like automatic payment options, online rentals, kiosk rentals to more complicated CRM programs and systems.

Taking into consideration, the current pandemic, and its impact on global economies, how are you driving Storage Authority to sustain operations and ensuring safety of your associates and employees at the same time?

Self-storage is having fantastic year and has not seen any negative effects due to Covid. In fact more people than ever are using self-storage. And occupancies and rates are at all-time highs. As an essential business we did not have to shut down and have been open full time. We continue to use contactless rentals and payments via the our Kiosk, online website rentals and of course over the phone.

What are your company’s future aspirations? What strategies are you undertaking to achieve those goals?

Our goal is to continue to ensure Storage Authority is a premium brand that provides our franchisees industry leading profits now and in the future. Part of that means we will need always be learning and adopting new and innovative business practices. While no business is passive or easy we strive to simplify and use technology where every possible.

As an established business leader, what would be your advice to the budding franchise leaders aspiring to venture into the franchise industry?

While owning a franchise does provide a huge head start and ongoing assistance, owning any business is not simple. Make sure you fully understand the work and are willing to make a commitment required to owning your own business.

For more information on the Storage Authority opportunity: storageauthorityfranchise.com/opportunity1/