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Early Adopters of Self Storage in the UK
26/07/2010

Although self storage is well established today in the UK it was unknown back in the early 1990’s, and the risks and rewards were not clearly established; the concept was originally developed in the USA. As towns in the mid-west were built, developers bought up land that had development potential. In order to make a return on their investment while they waited for planning for houses, the developers built garage units and marketed them for self storage: the concept was born.

This resulted in the idea being brought into cities and industrial warehouses being converted into an early form of self storage. The market in the US is very different from the UK in many ways; the population has a culture of moving in order to find work. This creates a natural market for self storage both for businesses, and for the domestic self storage user.

In the late 80’s and early 90’s, when opportunistic entrepreneurs considered importing the concept to the UK, they were unaware of the risk reward profile. In fact, the risks in the UK were far higher than in the US. The initial risk was the purchase of the land, or building, where self storage was to be established. This was substantially higher than in the US as land in the UK is somewhat more limited in supply. Secondly, the properties needed fitting out to provide for their target customers; this again was an expensive exercise. Typically before a single customer walked through the door, the entrepreneurial developer had laid out between two or three million pounds. Effectively, this money was spent before the concept had even been proven and it would also take time for the market to be educated in the idea of self storage.

However, the early adopters did take the risk and self storage in the UK was born. One of those early entrepreneurs was the current Chairman of Alligator Self Storage, Alister Jack. He was introduced to the concept by a friend and set about purchasing a building in Edinburgh to form a company. In those days, the Yellow Pages were the most important marketing medium and this inspired Aardvark Self Storage to be created. The first project was on Albion Road in Edinburgh; the first few months were a nail biting time while the customers began to occupy space. Approximately a year later, it became clear this was a business model that could evidently be successful throughout the UK. Alister went on to raise additional funds and after 5 years had a chain of 10 storage centres. This along with other early adopters saw the birth of the industry in the UK.

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