Running a business can be tough, whether you are struggling for sales, income, clients, exposure, staff or space, there are a hundred and one challenges that as a business owner, you seem to face on a daily or weekly basis.
Although businesses often fail due to the product not being right for the market, the organisation not being correct within the company or just economical conditions, businesses can also fail because they couldn’t quite push to the next level, for a varied selection of reasons. Businesses that cannot expand will at some stage reach a cap of earning potential, because no matter how good you are as a company and workforce, there are only so many hours in the day, and if you are fully booked 7 days a week with work, chasing the new contract can often get lost in the day to day grind.
Expansion for most businesses is the way forward, and whilst some firms will just want to stay the same size and just “earn enough”, many businesses want to continually evolve, push forward and increase their order books, as this is how they will hopefully grow into a larger business and of course start to make more money. Depending on the type of business, it is almost impossible to double the amount of clients you have without looking for more space, as more work often means more staff and trying to fit three people onto one desk is probably not going to be the best method for working productivity.
When it comes to business expansion and growing your business, moving to a bigger office or warehouse is an obvious thing to do, but then of course you are faced with needing to find a hefty amount of capital to make this move happen. Add to fact that many companies are simply happy with where they are based, meaning that moving to somewhere bigger that they can afford is out of the question. Yet, if they want to grow as a business, they need to grow in terms of space, so yet again they are left in the position of not being able to grow, despite having the potential to do so.
A possible solution to this age old problem is self storage, as hiring a storage unit is no longer just for Mr and Mrs Jones to store their furniture and possessions that they do not need at the moment in time or for the traveller that is heading around the world for 6 months and just needs somewhere to store their belongings. Self Storage from a commercial point of view is becoming more and more popular, which when you consider how quickly self storage has grown across the UK is really no surprise.
Although supply has undoubtedly helped to increase demand from businesses for storage units, one key factor is that hiring one or more storage units on an ongoing basis is usually going to be much cheaper than moving half of your workforce and company across town to a bigger office, not to mention the hassle, stress and downtime this often causes. With most towns and cities now being within a very short driving distance of a range of self storage facilities, it makes sense that a business can use these as an extension of their own business, without the need or the extra cost of expanding their physical premises.
Storage units can be used to store stock, paperwork, seasonal products, office furniture and so much more, and whilst you will not want to make your staff work from a unit, it can become an extension of your own office. With some types of paperwork needing to be stored for up to 7 years as a legal requirement, how often are you really going to want to access a file from 5 years ago? The answer is going to be rarely, especially as most documents will also be on your digital system, but you still need to keep these paper records.
From a stock point of view, imagine being able to keep spare stock at your unit or actually using it as a physical collection point for couriers, which most facilities now allow. This means you do not need loads of boxes or crates at your work premises, rather you store them elsewhere and send the products or items out when you get an order in. The same for seasonal stock, you really do not want Christmas decorations hanging around in Spring, so you can keep your stock safe and sound until the jingle bells start ringing again next year.
So if your business needs to expand, don’t let space become a problem, contact your local self storage facility and get some quotes, you will probably be very surprised how achievable this could be!
This article has been provided by Thornbury Self Storage, a leading, modern and family run Bristol and Gloucestershire self storage facility.