Human beings have an inordinate amount of stuff. We’ve all been in the position, seemingly over and over again, where we’re cleaning a room, closet, garage, basement, even something as small as a drawer, and we’re faced with a baffling question: where does all this stuff come from?
Our attachment to material possessions is no secret, too. We have so much stuff that the mini storage business is alive and doing so well that of the 2.3 billion square feet of secure storage facility space in the United States, as of 2015, about 90% of it is completely occupied. That’s a lot of stuff. Because self storage units are so widely used, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that some people out there have used their storage rental for some strange, interesting, and creative stuff. Of course, the confines of legality have been stretched and certainly broken in some instances, but we’ve got some secure storage facility foibles that you might find intriguing.
Preppers
If you’re not sure who preppers are, they’re the ones who stockpile survival supplies in case of the inevitable collapse of society as we know it: doomsday preppers. This makes us ask why they’d rely on a regulated storage space in the event of a mass societal collapse to store their survival supplies, but who are we to judge? Beyond the exaggerated nature of doomsday preppers, many people use these spaces for storing emergency supplies, within reason, for quick accessibility.
The office, studio, and gym
Musical groups, studio artists, startups, and people looking for an office space off the beaten path have definitely taken advantage of the secure storage facility. Not only does it act as a good place to store things, but why not add the extra convenience of working there, too? Tons of storage units have been turned into gyms, art studios, workshops, recording studios, and tech workspaces.
Literally a home
Sometimes this starts with storing furniture in a storage space, then progresses into organizing spatial feng shui and having people over to hang out in your out-of-home living room. The trouble is, once you’ve got a bunch of people visiting your living storage space, you’ll be attracting all sorts of attention, including the property manager who might not be keen on people using the facility as a living room. Some have even gone so far as to use it fully as a living space, which is creative, but not recommended and often pretty illegal.
Storage facilities certainly allow a level of flexibility in which you can make the space you want to see in the world, but it’s not without limitations. We’ve all seen the movies featuring clandestine meetings at abandoned storage spaces and that’s actually a reality. Get the lowdown from the people who run the place before you go setting up shop, then you can store, play, and live with your strangest things in peace.
