

Ask HN: Validate my storage company idea - tehwebguy

1. Snap a photo of the stuff you want in storage<p>2. Van rolls up to your house and picks it up<p>3. Driver hands you a key &#x2F; welcome package<p>Upfront fee would be based on volume, maybe pickup is free under a certain volume.<p>Still considering full or self service. Revenue would come from end users and partnerships with storage companies for customer contracts.
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tptacek
My guess is it'll be too expensive to deliver that service at a price point
anyone will be comfortable with. What are the margins on storage locker
businesses? There are a lot of them, and they seem like a business with very
few competitive barriers except for real estate costs, so my (uneducated,
untested) presumption is that the margins on those businesses are bad.

To that business, add truck rolls. Your costs just got drastically worse (and
in unexpected ways: for instance, a business that requires people to operate
motor vehicles is much more difficult to insure). How much higher can you jack
the price to compensate for that?

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patio11
Margins are _ridiculously_ variable. I have an Internet buddy whose product
is, basically, a $500 Excel spreadsheet which lets you model the effect of
e.g. a particular site's mortgage. The main reason for the app is that often
first-time business owners don't appreciate that ludicrously profitable
storage businesses look exactly like money-losing storage businesses from the
outside. (Similar to SaaS in a way.)

A well-run storage business is like a VPS or SaaS or pickle company: they make
their money "on the cut." My father the real estate developer thinks of
everything in terms of dollars per square foot, and routinely chuckles when
passing ones in Chicago. "Manhattan rents for Chicago real estate. God bless
them."

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kaisdavis
Patrick - what's the product your Internet buddy is selling?

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patio11
Prior to building this, talk to 10 storage company owners and confirm that
they're both amenable to you signing up customers for them and that they will
pay $400+ for that. You may find some who require a credit check, which they
may or may not be happy about you doing, for example.

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jeffmould
I guess my biggest question is how is this different from a company like PODS
or the other ones that bring a storage unit to your home, or wherever, and
once you fill it come back and take it to their warehouse for storage.

As someone who has moved across states several times, I can say that those
types of moves are the biggest headaches for logistics personally. There is
always a delay there either on receiving or sending side. On the self-storage
market the biggest headaches I have personally experienced is that when I
throw things in storage it tends to have absolutely no organization and I
usually get a unit that just isn't big enough. What then happens is I cram so
much stuff in, with no organization, that when I just happen to need something
I end up spending a day pulling everything out to find it.

My dad ran a moving company for years while I was growing up and I do think
there is room to move in this market I just don't know what area to target.
Mark Cuban had a tweet recently about it:
[https://twitter.com/mcuban/status/425750659531411456](https://twitter.com/mcuban/status/425750659531411456)

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tehwebguy
PODS & Pack-Rat are cool, and maybe they are the best someone could do in this
space right now. Not sure if these are enough but here are the issues with
those that I've been considering:

* Expensive ($60+ transport + fuel, $125+ /mo storage)

* Inconvenient for access (PODS requires 24 hr notice, the other needs 48)

* Inconvenient for apartments (require the box to be at the location for 24 hr)

Thanks for the comment, I'll keep thinking about this.

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jeffmould
A hybrid system of sorts may work good, but would be capital intensive. Say a
PODS like box is dropped off at your home or wherever. There could be two
models of these PODS. One with a trailer hitch and the other without. The ones
without would require scheduling a pickup and transport time. Either way there
would be an option for storage where you could take the pod when you are done
packing. The storage facilities would be spread out across the country. The
storage facilities would be like existing storage facilities with 24hr secured
access so you could get in/out anytime to access your pod. With your fee you
would have access to move your pod from one location to another anytime you
wanted.

For example, let's say I have a pod in Maryland, but am now moving to
California. I could just go to the storage facility, hook up my pod to my
trailer hitch, drive to California, and my monthly fee would give me access to
any other location that had space.

I think what Mark is referring to in his tweet, and something my dad saw in
his moving business, was people who just needed a couch or bed moved quickly
or something taken to the dump for them. Pull up an Uber like interface on
your phone and your request would go out to a variety of movers in your area
who have time to earn a quick buck for hauling your stuff for you.

Just some ideas.

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RickS
I and many of my classmates are in the process of graduating and moving from
NY to SF. There's usually a decent relo budget (1-6k), but the problem is that
it's a logistical nightmare.

The interstate moving industry is still in the dark ages. It could definitely
use the kind of service overhaul that's making uber and tesla famous.

What I and my peers want:

Drop a pod at my house in NY. I put all my stuff in it, you pick it up quickly
and get it to my new house in CA without breaking anything.

A sub-service of this could be the actual loading and unloading of contents.
I'm intentionally moving as lightly as possible, but I have some female
friends with heirloom furniture who are concerned about how the hell they're
going to get a 400 lb oak dresser from the crate to their 3rd floor apartment.

Some data required throughout the process: How much will this cost? So far
pods and the like won't let me get a quote online, which is absolutely
unacceptable. I want to be able to get a custom cost estimate that's accurate
to within $100. Flat rate by volume/weight * mile moved or whatever, just
figure something out that lets me know the cost easily upfront.

How long will it take? What's the fastest you can do it? Can I give you more
time for a lower rate, or pay for expedited shipping?

Dates - delivery, availability, everything - need to be insanely precise.
Issues like landlord office hours mean these dropoffs need to be meticulously
timed, and the stereotypical plumber hours where you'll show up randomly in an
8 hour range won't cut it here. I once gladly stomached a ticket for 88 in a
55 because it meant I could move into my new apartment on schedule.

So yeah. Storing stuff is easy. Moving stuff is hard. You don't need weird
revenue streams like storage partnerships - the revenue comes from the fact
that right now I could call probably 2 dozen people who would give you
thousands of dollars for this. Be the uber of interstate moving.

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canatan01
In NYC there is a sort of similar startup: Makespace. You ask them for storage
boxes and they bring those for free. You fill them and make an appointent to
fetch them from your house. They then bring it to their storage facility. Fee
per box. [http://makespace.com/invite/4dA/](http://makespace.com/invite/4dA/)

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tehwebguy
Wow, this is like the best case scenario of what I had in mind! Have you used
it yet?

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canatan01
Yep. I saw them during a NY tech meetup event and liked the concept and
happened to have stuff I needed storing. The site is great and service is
great. I wanted to schedule a drop off for the boxes but they were booked that
week. Problem was I was flying back to Europe that week and so really needed
them to bring the boxes. They were very flexible and got someone to drop the
boxes off before they made the usual rounds. Same for picking up the boxes a
few days later. Definitely can recommend them!

