Self Storage on YouTube

There are a remarkable number of short films and video clips about self storage on YouTube. They include impressive examples of TV advertising campaigns, useful “how-to” information videos, plus some hilarious comedy “shorts” that poke gentle fun at the self storage industry.

Self storage for laughs

Let’s start with the fun stuff, and go straight for the funny bone. The best comedy video about self storage has, surely, to the spoof advert for “Jones Big Ass Truck Rental and Storage”. This is one of a series of adverts featuring the decidedly dodgy Toby Jones, a character created by the Chicago-based comedian Robert Hines:

Here’s a second version:

If you like Toby Jones, you can catch more of his work on his website:

Self storage is ripe for humour ‒ at least that is what the creators of the sitcom “Self Storage” believed. Here is their pilot trailer, entered for FX Channel’s ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’ sitcom contest in 2006 (please excuse the graphic language):

This wonderfully chaotic scenario seems promising… but it didn’t win. If you put aside the chaos as wild exaggeration for humorous effect, it’s not a bad insight into what the storage business is about, and what self storage facilities look like. This pilot also spawned number of ancillary videos, such as Self StorageTips which take a humorous approach to real enough self storage issues, such as:

Practical matters

There are qute a few more sober how-to videos on YouTube. Some of these are from the prodigious Howcast stable, such as this one entitled “How to pack boxes for a move”:

Storage.co.uk has its own collection, of course, and you do not have to go as far as YouTube to find them: the link is right here:

Selling self storage

Self storage being such a big industry, it is no surprise that a considerable amount of energy and treasure has been invested in TV and web-video advertising. There are some slick advertisements, such as this one with a James Bond theme, for Westco, a state-of-the-art self storage facility in Torrance, California:

Humour works here too, witness the talking stuffed moose head pleading his case for Manhattan Ministorage:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Ikn9g1R6o0&feature=related

Or this one, for the US company Public Storage, which offers a solution to the problems posed by the execrable taste of your spouse:

Public Storage does the same quickfire delivery for downsizing at the other end of life’s trajectory:

Some companies are prepared to risk using a darker kind of humour, as in this “granny storage” concept from Safestore:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UTYqEgINIk

Many advertisers simply take a straightforward approach to delivering information. If you are new to self storage and want an idea about what a modern self storage looks like, this American film for Hippo Storage, in Kingsland, Georgia, does the job in an agreeably homespun way:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hNDTDop2y8&NR=1

In the UK, Smart Storage, in the Liverpool area, covers the ground well in their web film:

as does Safe Depot, of Blackburn, Bury and Birkenhead:

But the most sophisticated, and most famous, TV advertisement for self storage surely has to be Big Yellow’s “Tide”. Note how the three successive waves represent our material progression through life:

The achievement of that advertisement is celebrated by this intriguing video, which shows the extraordinary lengths they went to, to make “Tide”.

If you know of more, brilliant videos about Self Storage, please share them with us in the “Leave a Reply” comment box below