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2011-09-01 08:23:30
By Tom de Castella & Kate Dailey BBC News Magazine
People are leaving their possessions in self-storage warehouses for longer than
ever. But why are people paying to store stuff they rarely use?
It's a monument to our acquisitive society - the brightly lit shed on the edge
of town offering "storage solutions".
Society has always had its hoarders. But in the 21st Century people are farming
out their junk to the growing number of self-storage facilities.
It begins as a temporary solution. You load up the car with the retired
pushchair, an African sculpture you never found room for, old letters, bin bags
full of clothes, Betamax tapes and your cherished back issues of National
Geographic.
Shortly afterwards you're at one or other of the huge hangars offering space
for your beloved objects.
With summer the busiest time of year to move, many will have recently
contemplated a similar scenario.
The mania for storage centres began in the US in the 1960s and the country now
has over 50,000 such facilities. They arrived in London in the 1990s but didn't
take off across the UK until 2000. Britain has 800 major self-storage units,
the same as the rest of Europe put together.
It's the ideal stopgap while you get organised and there are knockdown
three-month offers to entice you.
But out of sight is out of mind. Recent statistics show that people are leaving
their junk in storage units for longer and longer.
Data from the UK Self Storage Association suggests that the average length of
stay has risen from 22 weeks in 2007 to 38 weeks in 2010.
And newspapers have found horror stories where people have forked out thousands
of pounds to keep their possessions in storage for years on end, despite never
visiting the warehouse to take them out.
The consumer society means many people are gradually running out of space, says
Cory Cooke, a professional organiser based in London.
The sentimental hoarder
Magazine editor Steve Barrett began using Big Yellow in London when he got
married. "It was for all the stuff my wife wouldn't allow in the house." After
several years he managed to clear out his stuff. But when he moved to New York
18 months ago, he rented a unit at an independent self-storage facility in
Hammersmith for 70 a month.
He'd given away his television and DVD player but found it too painful to part
with records, books and "assorted sentimental crap". He's been paying ever
since - " 1,260 and counting" - but prefers not to think about the cost. "It
makes no financial sense. It's an emotional thing. I'm storing up my youth in a
big box."
"More and more stuff comes in and it's not going out. I want to say it's a
throwout society, but it's not the case because people are keeping their things
around."
The increasing proportion of business users during the recession is one reason
average storage time has increased, says Rodney Walker, chief executive of the
SSA. Business users stay for 56 weeks and private individuals stay for 27 weeks
on average.
But even before the recession, private users were staying longer, mainly
because of cramped modern housing. "More people are living alone in smaller
homes without garages or attics," he says.
And then there's the vogue for minimalisation. With clean lines and empty
interiors the order of the day, all this "junk" has to be put out of sight,
even at a cost.
Student in messy room Clutter: Is a self-storage unit the answer?
TV property presenter Sarah Beeny is not a fan. People often sign up believing
it's just a short-term fix, she says. "The problem is that on a weekly basis it
doesn't seem like much money. But you end up staying longer - out of sight, out
of mind."
It's a worry for society. People are using valuable land in prime areas of
overcrowded cities like New York and London to build these warehouses, spending
money on renting the units and in the process accumulating more and more stuff.
Often people are just looking for a good home for something, she says. "I had
20 plastic chairs for children's picnics. I felt like I couldn't throw them
away so have had them sitting around. Finally somewhere wants them and I'm
delighted they're going to a good home."
Such a mentality explains the success of the website Freecycle, a community of
users who give away the objects they no longer need to other people who do need
them.
The frustrated mover
James Green (not his real name), a Cheshire businessman, has used Big Storage
in Macclesfield since the end of 2007. His family had recently arrived in the
north-west of England and were renting a small house while they looked to buy a
bigger place. Nearly four years on, they are still living there.
He is spending "several hundred pounds a month" to store furniture, books and
clothing. "We go in once or twice a month, and as the seasons change, taking
stuff out and putting other stuff back in." He likes the convenience it offers
even if he didn't expect to be using it for so long. "It's the price you pay
for flexibility."
In a survey of UK households by Access Self Storage, 90% of respondents
reported an inability to part with treasured possessions. It may be the
accumulated memories that schoolbooks, birthday cards, photographs, old books
or clothes hold for us.
But this is only part of the story, says Brian Knutson, an associate professor
of psychology at Stanford University. The "endowment effect" is just as
important.
This is the economic theory in which - by the mere fact of owning something we
endow a possession with more value than its market price.
It might explain why people spend a huge sum putting an old sofa in storage for
a year rather than using that money to buy a new one.
"Almost everyone wants more for something once they own it, than they will pay
to get it," says Knutson.
Oliver James, psychologist and author of Affluenza, says that the self-storage
phenomenon can be explained by consumerism's effect on how we view ourselves.
Our identity has increasingly become associated with products, he argues, and
not just the mortgage and the car, but smaller items. "We've confused who we
are with what we have," he says.
It explains why we're so reluctant to throw things away. "We feel it might come
in handy one day. It feels like it's a little part of yourself even though it's
just tat. You wouldn't want to throw yourself away would you?"
Or perhaps it's not that complex. When it comes to a closet full of clutter,
"people don't want to make the decisions," so put it off for another day, says
Cooke.
"It's taxing, and a lot of people find it easier to box it up and deal with it
later."