🧠 A Portable Self Storage Business ft. Stetson Stallworth
How Stetson is building a $7,000 / Month Remote Cleaning Business. How to create Value and How Many Businesses Fail?
1. Business idea of the Week: Shipping Container Storage Units
This week I sat down with @Stetson to talk about how he’s building a remote cleaning business, and what business idea he’s most excited about.
You can listen to the full interview on Spotify, or watch it on Youtube.
Here’s the idea in Stetsons words…
During a time of rapid innovation, here’s an idea that is both old and new – boring yet innovative…
The Self Storage game is not played the same way it was 10 years ago. The days of Mom & Pop operators raking in “the big bucks” with handshake deals and a notepad is over.
Disruption has hit the industry and hit it hard.
Self storage facilities may look like nothing more than big metal boxes, but they’re using technology more than ever. Organizations and best practices have formed to both educate and automate the business.
Now, I know what you’re thinking…
Self Storage isn’t new. Why are you talking like it is?
Well my friends, there is a void in society that needs to be filled and calls on entrepreneurs like us to do so.
1 in 10 American households rent a storage unit on a monthly basis.
With that in mind, storage is a national necessity.
Across America, there are small towns of 1,000 – 3,000 people that don’t have access to storage and these small markets aren’t appealing to large storage companies.
Because of this, there’s opportunity to come up with a scalable solution.
The idea: Create a portable storage unit business in small towns that don’t have access to large storage facilities.
In the same way that shipping containers are emerging as an affordable housing option, they can also be used in the storage space.
By renovating and repurposing shipping containers as long-term storage, it can drastically decrease the cost per square foot to develop a facility, making it more attractive for a single operator.
By leveraging these “portable” storage units, facilities will decrease risk by becoming flexible and nimble, which will be necessary when operating in these small markets.
Ex. For obvious reasons, it is much easier for a town of 1,500 people to double in size than a town of 1.5 million people.
Because of this, an operator’s need for storage could double in just a few years.
Instead of being tied to stationary buildings, an operator can easily replace parking storage with self storage, which traditionally has a higher yield per square foot.
Finally, let’s not forget about the real estate component…
Portable storage solutions make it easy for operators to turn raw land into a cash flowing asset.
And the fact that tax and depreciation strategies apply to both traditional and portable storage, makes this a no-brainer.
This idea is not sexy, new, or really even innovative.
But it is a simple, powerful, and repeatable solution to a problem that needs fixing.
2. How to Actually Create Value.
People love to throw around the word Value.
Value is defined as “the importance, worth, or usefulness of something”.
Simply put, business is the exchange of Value for Money.
But how do you actually create value? And increase the value of your offer?
Alex Hormozi writes the perfect value formula in his $100M Offers book:
So what does this mean?
The idea is to increase your customers Dream Outcome & Perceived Likelihood of Achieving it.
At the same time, decrease the Time it takes & Effort/Sacrifice required.
Let’s use a lawn care business as an example.
Dream Outcome = Perfect looking lawn.
Perceived Likelihood of Achievement = Customers believe you can make their lawn look perfect.
Time Delay = Get it done as soon as the client wants it.
Efforts & Sacrifice = Make the decision easy, take care of scheduling without the client worrying, and charge what it’s worth.
The more value you create = the more $$$ you can charge.
3. How Many Businesses Fail?
You’ve probably heard something like “90% of all businesses fail”.
But is it actually true?
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, here’s what the actual numbers look like:
20% of new businesses fail during the first 2 years.
45% of new businesses fail during the first 5 years.
65% of new businesses fail during the first 10 years.
and only 25% of new businesses make it past 15 years.
These look like much better odds to me.
Many businesses blame failure on “a bad market”, “not enough funding”, or “not being able to scale”.
In my opinion, one of the biggest reasons for failure is a lack of patience.
Businesses can take 1-2 years just to hit a stride and start growing.
The problem is that most people don’t have 1-2 years of patience to keep pushing when things don’t go the way they thought it would.
What do you think is the biggest reason businesses fail?
Comment below.
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