Thread: SST in a NY Times Mag Article!!!

First off, a very thorough, researched and long article on the self-storage industry from a fairly reputable source, I'd say:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/06/ma...storage-t.html

And oh yeah, they reference this forum! In fact, writer Jon Mooallem must have been poking around the site and found this thread:
I feel dirty...

Wayne (autodoc), you were quoted in the New York Times!

Warning: Article is long but it's worth the read.

Wow article is long but very worth it. Kinda neat to not only read about SST but to see many of the upcoming expo speakers quoted as well. Derek Naylor, Tom Litton and Jim Chiswell.

Great article -- but then how could it not be great when they are quoting the smartest man I know ME!!!

I think the entire 2 to 3% came from our facility

From what I've heard so far, the occupancy has dropped more than that nationwide but I'm happy for the industry if it's only 2-3%.

It was a long article, and the comment about the gal living with Grandma and the biscuits... yum...

Overall, it was a good article and didn't slam us so that was a good thing. Thanks to Derek, Mr. Jim and Tom for their input to the article. Oh yeah, and that lil Mouse dude too!

But this quote from Ronald L. Havner Jr., Public Storage’s chief executive, is an odd way to describe the property of the tenants at his facilities...

... “I’ve sometimes said that we could put a torch to this building and it would have zero effect on the local economy — because that’s how much junk is stored in our properties.”

One person's junk is another person's treasures... oh well.

yeah, I didn't understand that one either -- talking about biting the had that feeds you

Originally Posted by geraldine1051

But this quote from Ronald L. Havner Jr., Public Storage’s chief executive, is an odd way to describe the property of the tenants at his facilities...

... “I’ve sometimes said that we could put a torch to this building and it would have zero effect on the local economy — because that’s how much junk is stored in our properties.”

One person's junk is another person's treasures... oh well.

Aw, come on guys... I just read right over it... the second time over. I didn't understand that comment either, so I re-read it to make sure I read what I thought I had read. Then it was a "Huh? What?" The biscuit & gravy comment didn't fit into the article either but what the heck!

Course I took his comment to be; our location being burnt down wouldn't impact the local economy. Maybe it's an extremely under-performing site? Or there is the slim chance he was misquoted.

Just a quick follow-up on the NYT article ... When the article came out last week, I thought, "OK, now that the Times has run this, newspapers across the country are going to scramble to write something similar about self-storage in their respective areas." And the scramble has begun. There are a few such pieces coming through the Google news feed this morning. But in particular, I saw this piece in The Consumerist:

Consumers Reevaluating Their Decision To Pay To Store A Bunch of Junk

The NYT article is heavily quoted, with a few added comments. Thought it would be interesting to follow the trail of spin-off articles.