Sentry Self Storage LLC, a provider of third-party management services to the self-storage industry, has promoted two of its area managers to the position of district manager. Denise Maggio is now district manager of Texas. Lissette Ramos is district manager of Central Florida.

Maggio joined Sentry in 2007 and most recently served as area manager of Houston and San Antonio, Texas. She previously had a 12-year career in self-storage operation and training with Extra Space Storage Inc. and Storage USA.

Denise brings a wealth of experience to her new role, and we are excited about her new role at the company," said Rick Yonis, president of Sentry.

Ramos joined the company in 2009 and most recently served as area manager of Central Florida. She previously spent 13 years working at CubeSmart and Storage USA.

Lissettes broad-based operational experience will be incredibly valuable to Sentry as we grow our platform," Yonis said.

Based in Coral Spring, Fla., Sentry Self Storage provides industry management and consulting services. The company currently has 40 properties under management in several states, working with 18 ownership groups.

As the self-storage industry expands globally, so have the international education offerings at the Inside Self-Storage World Expo in Las Vegas, the industry’s largest conference and tradeshow. Attendees of the concurrent education program on March 31 will have the opportunity to participate in a five-session International Track that will highlight the Latin American region as well as challenges and development opportunities in other markets around the world.

Beginning at 9 a.m., “Self-Storage Latin America, Part I” will kick off three consecutive sessions presented in Spanish. Designed for operators, developers and investors interested in the region, the first session will examine market trends and strategies operators can use to increase profits. It will be presented by Lucia Darnell, director of the Spanish department at PhoneSmart, a self-storage call center and marketing firm.

The 10 a.m. session, “Self-Storage Latin America, Part II,” will focus on conducting market feasibility studies, including where to find good data, how to analyze competition, build-out strategies and more. This seminar will be presented by Nancy Torres, director of business development for Latin America at Janus International Corp., a manufacturer of self-storage roll-up doors and building components.

At 11 a.m., the third Spanish-speaking session will focus on aspects of operating and managing a self-storage facility in Latin America. It will be presented by Arie Rezepka, CEO of Aki KB Minibodegas, a self-storage operator in Chile.

The two afternoon sessions will be conducted in English and examine issues pertaining to foreign markets in addition to Latin America. Beginning at 1 p.m., “Developing and Opening a Self-Storage Facility In an Emerging Market” will focus on development challenges and opportunities in regions new to self-storage. The session will be presented by John Scheibe, founder and general manager of Go Self Storage Brazil, which develops facilities throughout the country. Scheibe will discuss the importance of understanding local culture and consumers, provide tips on how to find good local professionals and more.

Closing out the track at 2 p.m. will be an international panel discussion hosted by RK Kliebenstein, vice president of acquisitions at Metro Storage LLC, which operates more than 90 Metro Self Storage facilities in 11 states and recently opened its first MetroFit location in São Paulo, Brazil. At nearly two hours, this double session will feature a panel of operators and vendors from around the world, including Australia, Canada, Central America, Europe, South America and the United Arab Emirates.

The expo’s concurrent education program, March 31 and April 1, includes 10 tracks covering issues related to self-storage ownership, management, marketing, investment, finance, building, development, liability and more. Five add-on workshop options are also available.

The conference and tradeshow will take place at the Paris Hotel & Resort. Extended early-bird registration rates are available through Feb. 13.

Created for self-storage industry owners, managers, developers, investors and suppliers, the ISS Expo comprises four days of education, exhibits and networking opportunities. The event focuses on strategies for generating revenue, industry best practices, current trends, and new products and services. Details and online registration are available at www.insideselfstorageworldexpo.com.

AMERCO, the parent company of U-Haul International Inc., reported financial results for the quarter ended Dec. 31, the third quarter of its 2014 fiscal year. Self-storage revenue increased $7 million, nearly 18 percent, year over year to $46.1 million. Average monthly occupancy in company-owned facilities was 80 percent during the quarter, up from 78.1 percent for the same period in 2012.

U-Haul has added approximately 2.1 million net rentable square feet to its corporate self-storage portfolio during the last 12 months. As of Dec. 31, square footage was nearly 17.8 million.

Companywide, AMERCO reported net earnings available to common shareholders of $52.2 million, $2.67 per share, compared to $36.8 million, $1.89 per share, for the same period the previous year.

"In multiple, very-competitive marketplaces, U-Haul team members are working to increase our service to the customer," said Joe Shoen, chairman of AMERCO.

Operating earnings at the companys moving-and-storage segment increased $19.4 million in the quarter compared with the same period in 2012. Total revenue climbed $63.4 million but was partially offset by a $44 million increase in total costs and expenses.

AMERCO is the parent company of U-Haul International, Oxford Life Insurance Co., Repwest Insurance Co. and Amerco Real Estate Co. Established in 1945, U-Haul more than 40 million square feet of storage space at more than 1,000 owned and managed facilities throughout North America.

Apple Self Storage of Canada has announced its intention to continue growth and renew investment in the company, starting with the launch of a third-party management platform and the recent hiring of David Allan as business development manager.

Apple Self Storage Management was created to make the company's industry experience available to independent self-storage operators, according to a press release. Allan's experience in providing customer solutions to the service industry will be a benefit to current clients and those who become part of the Apple success story, company officials said.

"Our clients will increase revenues, share expenses and become more competitive using the Apple Self Storage Management platform,” said Michael Naoum, general manager.

Apple has made a significant investment in social media and the Internet and is now experiencing monthly gains in reservations, rentals and other customer interactions though this new electronic portal, according to the release.

Based in Aurora, Ontario, Apple has built, acquired or converted more than 30 self-storage facilities in the past 15 years. It currently owns and operates 15 facilities and has another three under management in Ontario, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. The company was launched in 1999 when Jeff, Phil and Scott Allan bought and developed their first self-storage facility in Ontario after a successful career as partners in the technology world.

U.K. self-storage operator The Store Room has completed a £200,000 expansion of its facility in Leeds, England. The work was completed over a two-week period in January and was officially opened last week. A number of  domestic and commercial customers have already moved into the new space, according to a press release.

The expansion was driven by an increase in consumer in the second half of 2013, which left the Ring Road facility close to capacity. It comprises units ranging from 25 to 1,000 square feet.

We found ourselves short of space in 2013, and we therefore added more rooms in January of this year," said Jeremy Bradburn, managing director. "The local economy has definitely picked up since August 2013, with local businesses and people moving house being the main growth areas. Our inquiries and customer numbers are up significantly year on year, which shows us that the local Leeds economy is starting to pick up; and this gives us great confidence for the months ahead.

The Store Room also recently completed a 10,000-square-foot expansion of its Leicester site.

Established in 2007 and headquartered in Manchester, The Store Room operates self-storage facilities in the English communities of Bradford, Leeds, Leicester, Manchester, Preston and Rotherham.

By Amy Daniels

When you own or manage a self-storage facility, you’re likely quite concerned with your occupancy rate. You could probably tell me what your rate is right now. The question is, which occupancy rate are you using?

When industry experts evaluate recent occupancy-rate trends, they tend to speak of the ratio of occupied to total units, commonly expressed as a percentage. For example, if I tell you my occupancy rate is 86 percent, I’m probably saying that 14 percent of my units are currently vacant.

I sat down with Tom Cox, director of marketing and technology with Strat Property Management Inc., which manages more than 34 self-storage facilities in California and Texas, to gain some valuable insight to different occupancy types. He says there are three: unit occupancy, square-foot occupancy and economic occupancy. Here’s a breakdown of each, with basic examples:

With three separate ways of measuring your facility’s occupancy, you can develop a thorough understanding of how it's performing, as well as discover areas where you can make improvements to your marketing strategy.

Relationships Between Rates

The best way to conduct a comprehensive analysis of your occupancy is to examine the relationships between your three rates. While your unit and square-foot occupancy rates likely hover within a few percentage points of each another, your economic rate tends to trail behind. All those specials and discounts you’ve been offering may have brought more people to your facility and ultimately increased your unit and square-foot rates; but while your units are filling up, you’re charging below full price, which has a direct impact on economic occupancy.

Your unit and square-foot occupancy should be pretty similar, but you can still fine-tune your marketing by comparing them:

Square foot > unit occupancy = Larger units are more popular

Square foot < unit occupancy = Smaller units are more popular

Why is this? Allow me to demonstrate with a simple example. (Naturally, your number of units as well as unit sizes will vary.)

In this illustration, 10-by-10 units are the most popular. If I pulled these numbers from my software and I was only looking at the total occupancy rates in that right-hand column, I would be able to tell instantly that my larger units are more popular than my smaller ones.

The relationship of unit occupancy to square-foot occupancy can indicate which units to focus on as you advertise or develop promotions, which is helpful in maintaining your economic rates. If I based my strategy on unit occupancy alone, I might lower my rates or offer specials that applied to my facility as a whole. But by comparing these rates to each other, I know my larger units are doing pretty well. To preserve my economic rate as much as possible, I can simply hone in on the smaller units when I develop my specials.

Analyzing Rates to Make More Money

According to Cox, there's a natural process self-storage operators should follow to make the highest profit. This proposed sequence makes the overwhelming idea of managing three sets of occupancy rates much less intimidating.

No. 1: Fill up your units to increase unit occupancy. Particularly if your unit occupancy is low, you may want to focus on putting out specials and discounts. This approach is important. If you simply wait for units to fill up at their current price, you'll be losing money every month they go vacant. While you won’t make as much money as you’d like when you lower the rates, you’ll be losing much less than if you make none.

No. 2: Use your square-foot occupancy to find trends. Are your 5-by-5s always hovering around 85 percent occupancy while your 10-by-20s struggle to make it past the 60 percent mark? Take a close look at which units are selling and work to fill the units that are suffering.

But don’t feel limited to lowering rates. Look at your market and examine trends in your square-foot occupancy. If you see patterns of smaller units filling up more easily than larger ones, consider converting large units into several smaller ones. For example, you could turn a 10-by-10 into four 5-by-5 units, which will make you more money as you fill them up.

No. 3: Maximize your profit with economic occupancy. Once your unit and square-foot occupancy has improved, consider how you can earn more money on your units. It’s important that you wait to do this because you don’t want to command full price if certain units aren’t in high demand.

You’ll typically find that your economic occupancy is much lower than your unit and square-foot rates. As you work hard to move people into your facility, you’re likely doing so at a discounted rate. So how do you know your economic occupancy is where it should be? If it hovers less than 10 percent below, your rates are probably right where they should be to start thinking about revenue management.

No. 4: Employ revenue-management tactics. So is 100 percent occupancy the ultimate goal? Well … no. Of course, it’s the number you’re striving for with each of your occupancy rates. But if your facility is enjoying near 100 percent occupancy, your rates are too low, and you’re missing out on potential profit.

By examining all three types of self-storage occupancy rates, operators will have a better understanding of how their facility is faring and marketing strategies they should consider to bring in more renters and generate bigger revenue. 

Amy Daniels is the content writing manager at StorageAhead, a provider of online-marketing services for the self-storage industry, and StorageFront, a self-storage lead-generation site. She enjoys the process of combining self-storage industry research, powerful Web marketing strategies, and small-business experience to cultivate the growth of facilities nationwide.

Metro Self-Storage, which operates 12 facilities serving Atlantic Canada, has received a 2014 Consumer Choice Award (CCA) for its self-storage location at 10 Lovett Lake Court in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Each year, CCA contracts with Canadian market-research firm Leger Marketing to survey consumers all across the country, gathering their opinions, perceptions and expectations regarding the services they choose on a daily basis. The top-ranked providers receive the CCA "seal of excellence."

This is the fourth time Metro Self-Storage has received the local honor, according to a company news announcement.  

CCA, established in 1987, is considered one of the most distinguished awards for business excellence in Canada. It is the only organization in North America to conduct third-party market research of the consumer and business community with statistical accuracy, according to the source. The research method determines all the service providers, ultimately selects the top-ranked companies, and establishes the winner within each industry.

CCA awards are presented in Calgary, Edmonton, Halifax, Hamilton, London, Montreal, Ottawa, Quebec City, Regina, Saskatoon, St. John's, Toronto, Vancouver and Winnipeg.

Self-storage real estate investment trust CubeSmart has named a senior vice president of operations and a series of related executive changes in the areas of company operation, marketing, third-party management and investor relations.

"Over the past year, we worked diligently and thoughtfully through a leadership succession process. The goal of that process was to align our management team to support our operational vision and execute on our internal and external growth strategies," said Christopher Marr, CEO. "The changes we are announcing today are designed to maximize the collective contributions of our senior management. I am excited about these role changes and am confident in our team's ability to continue to create value for our shareholders."

Joel Keaton has been promoted from vice president of marketing to senior vice president of operations and will have direct oversight of the company's 531 storage locations. He has more than 20 years of self-storage experience, including management positions at two other industry REITs and a national provider of self-storage management services.

Daniel Ruble has replaced Keaton as vice president of marketing. He previously served as vice president of finance, coordinating the company's investor-relations function. He also held various positions in operations, analytics and investments since joining CubeSmart in 2009.

Guy Middlebrooks has been named vice president of third-party management, replacing Carol Shipley, who has retired. Middlebrooks previously served as vice president of operations. He has more than 25 years of retail and self-storage operations experience.

Charles Place has joined CubeSmart as director of investor relations. He has experience in investment banking, equity research covering the REIT industry, and most recently, market research for a private, triple-net lease REIT.

CubeSmart owns or manages 531 self-storage facilities across the United States and operates the CubeSmart Network, which consists of more than 800 additional self-storage facilities.

The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) will be vacating its historical building in the South Bronx, N.Y., and borough president Ruben Diaz Jr. does not want to see the structure occupied by a self-storage business. Although no plans or bids have been put forth by the USPS for the block-long building at 558 Grand Concourse, Diaz spoke out last week in opposition to possible storage projects during a panel discussion of borough presidents hosted by the New York Law School.

The building, the way that it is now, is ripe for, say, a storage company to come in, Diaz said. And I will crazy-glue myself to the door before I will allow that to happen.

Constructed in 1935, the 170,560-square-foot Bronx General Post Office is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The landmark includes 13 large egg tempura murals created in 1938 by artists Ben Shahn and Bernarda Bryson, who were commissioned by the U.S. Treasury, according to the USPS. The collective works are titled Resources of America.

The four-story buildings historical status limits its potential uses, according to the source. There are also preservation covenants for the building and murals that will be included in the private sale, according to the listing by the USPS.

Diaz called the postal facility a beautiful, magnificent building, and said he would like to see access by the general public preserved in its future use. He mentioned a mini-market or something academic-related as possibilities. It is across the street from Eugenio María de Hostos Community College.

As part of the sale, the USPS will require a leaseback agreement of up to 12 months while its new facility is completed. During the leaseback, the USPS will pay rent of $1, while also paying all operating expenses and taxes for the property, according to the sale listing.