Storage Franchise

While going for a self storage franchise is undoubtedly a good business move, one distinct challenge is that there are actually very few companies that offer franchises. One of the main reasons for this is that when a couple of self storage companies offered opportunities for investments a few years ago, very few people signified their interest in such an endeavor. Many potential investors seemed to feel that a self storage franchise simply did not offer the same benefits as franchises in other areas such as the food business. A look at the nature of the franchise industry will explain this more clearly.

Franchises involve the business owner giving a potential franchisee a legal right to own and operate a business according to an original concept, under the business' trademark. The franchisee is expected to pay a franchise fee and will stand to benefit from both the brand of the business as well as the marketing efforts of the franchiser in return.

With the somewhat fragmented nature of the self storage business however, many of these benefits simply cannot be realized. With no clear leaders in the industry, the self storage franchise business simply does not offer the same brand recall benefits that the food business does. In fact, even the largest self storage company in the industry is only responsible for about 5% of the entire market share. Even taking the five biggest self storage companies into consideration will only account for about 10% of the entire self storage industry.

Since there isn't really much in the way of business secrets or any other factor that is hard to replicate in the self storage industry, there is very little reason for customers to remain loyal to one particular company. For most people self storage is just a means to avail of space and nothing more. In addition, the self storage industry does not require much in the way of technical expertise that a certain company can potentially use to retain the loyalty of their customers, or to cause them to choose their company in preference to another.

That being said, a self storage franchise will give the investor the benefit of being able to utilize the franchising company's marketing campaign, storage facility design, and business experience. These are crucial factors in any business, and the owner of a self storage franchise will greatly benefit from these.