Storage Wars: a new US TV series
December saw the launch of a new “real life” series in the USA, called Storage Wars ‒ following the antics of a set of larger-than-life fortune-hunters who buy the contents of abandoned storage units. It has caused quite a stir: will it be coming to the UK soon?
Self storage auctions
Storage Wars is a sort of reality TV show, dealing with the genuine US phenomenon of self storage auctions. When self storage renters default on payment, the self storage facility can legitimately sell off the contents of their unit in an effort to recoup some of the lost income.
These auctions follow a surprising but pragmatic formula: potential buyers are given just five minutes or so to look at the contents of the unit from the threshold ‒ looking without touching ‒ and then they bid for possession of the entire contents of that unit as a job lot, basing their judgement primarily on instinct, experience and their willingness to gamble.
This was the world explored by Gayle Brandeis in her Self Storage: A Novel (2007), reviewed in our earlier blog.
From self storage to Storage Wars
As the programme’s own website puts it, Storage Wars “follows four professional buyers and their teams as they scour repossessed storage units in search of hidden treasure. Part gamblers, part detectives, these seasoned veterans have found everything from coffins to the world’s most valuable comic book collection, paying as little as ten dollars for items valued in the millions.” It’s a game of high risk and high stakes, summarised by such statements as “You never know when you’re going to hit the jackpot,” and “Get rich or die buyin’.”
The broadcasting company behind Storage Wars, A&E, has a reputation for producing popular “real life” series that deliver a heady mix of documentary and entertainment (A&E stands for Arts and Entertainment, and they have definitely moved towards the latter in recent years). Their successful series called Hoarders, about compulsive hoarding, was launched in 2009 and is now in its third series.
A joint venture between the Hearst Corporation, the Walt Disney Company and NBC Universal, A&E is a major player, reaching 85 million homes across North America. When they do a show, they don’t do it by halves.
For the moment, in the UK you can only peek at the bits of Storage Wars that appear on YouTube, but it’s enough to see its appeal. A set of larger-than-life characters are pitted against each other ‒ in a unscripted, but semi-dramatised way ‒ in a bid to achieve the fabulous successes that storage auction legends are made of: how, among piles of unpromising sacks and cartons, successful bidders have found silver and gold, valuable collectibles, even an antique car, turning (often riskily high) bids of $700 or so into $100,000 or more, virtually overnight.
So far, public reaction to Storage Wars in the USA seems to be generally favourable, although some critics have pointed out that the series does exploit genuine misery for the purposes of entertainment: usually the story behind storage payment default is hardship of some kind, most often financial, but also life-crises ‒ aggravated by the current economic downturn. Is the programme offensively insensitive? It certainly invites that debate.
Storage Wars in the UK?
If the show proves successful in the USA, it may well reach these shores. Other A&E productions have been broadcast here, including Dog the Bounty Hunter, shown on Bravo and Channel One (both owned by Sky).
Storage Wars would have to appeal primarily on the basis of its own dynamic storytelling ‒ another curious and skilfully told insight into the USA’s unique way of doing things. Certainly the UK doesn’t have an equivalent culture of storage auctions.
Storage auctions are much less common in the UK partly because the UK’s self storage industry is much smaller than America’s, and partly because the UK population is less mobile, so managers of self storage facilities can and will track down owners who default on rent at an early stage, and will try to negotiate an exit strategy. Any self storage facility manager would much prefer a fully rented unit: an auction sale of contents is the last resort, and provides only minimal compensation for lost rent and the hassle of dealing with default.
Nevertheless, UK storage auctions do take place from time to time ‒ often enough for some self storage companies to include warnings in their small print, such as that of Bideford Van Hire and Self Storage: “Failure to pay the monthly charges will result in customers being denied access to their unit and may result in the goods being sold at public auction to recover any outstanding fees or losses.”
If Storage Wars is broadcast here and catches on, the cult of the storage auctions will surely follow on.
13 Responses to “Storage Wars: a new US TV series”
Leave a Reply
Subscribe to This Blog
Get new blog posts sent to you by subscribing to RSS updates or to email updates.
Search
Categories
We’ve been following Storage Wars on our blog, too. It’s surely sensationalized but also surprisingly entertaining…
“Storage Wars” has proved a big success in the USA, as far as we can tell – both with the public and with the self storage industry. Dan Dotson, auctioneer from “Storage Wars”, will be a special guest speaker at the Inside Self-Storage World Expo (March 14-16, at the Paris Hotel and Resort in Las Vegas). As the ISS promotional web page puts it, it’s an opportunity to “get an inside look at how to maximize your storage auction experience by increasing your revenue potential and learning the do’s and don’ts of lien sales that will protect your facility.”
I think “Storage Wars” has a very similar emotional draw as something like “Antique Roadshow” – appealing to the idea that there are goldmines to be had all around us. All in all, it’s one of the few TV shows I watch since it’s so related to our industry.
A very good show that I enjoy watching, its good to see the drama unfold, but it is also nice to get a look around self storage units of various shapes sizes and layouts.
where in uk can i watch storage wars
It is being shown on digital channels Bio and History most nights.
We caught this when in NY last week & love it! We’ve just Sky+ed both series – would love to see a UK version!
Interesting because in Canada the storage business is also less developed (sq ft per 1000 ppl) than in the USA. I was told a few years back that Canada was 10 years behind in development. Is it really true that UK population is less mobile than US population? I thought there was a lot of immigration going on there.
My concern is that the show does not properly portray the true costs of doing the business – all the profit numbers are Gross Without Expenses (other than the initial investment)
Download software called Hotspot Shield, when you run it it assigns you an american ip address and hides your real one, you can then watch full episodes of Storage Wars on http://www.spike.com.
HERE IS A PREVIEW OF STORAGE WARS
http://www.megavideo.com/?d=WH0VI7KM
I have been watching this show for a few weeks now and I LOVE IT!!!!! So entertaining!!! Its great to see them pick up some great finds!! it is a bit ”over the top” in true american style but it works if you ask me. I do see the point of making a show from others misfortune…BUT! it’s not as if that person is shown and the misery broadcast, not being funny but these people are told from the off they will lose their gear if they don’t pay up. Take the comic book collection… if I had ran out of money i’d have had that gear out of that lock up quicker than you could sneeze! lol so in a round about way… it’s their own fault…
If you are looking for good storage auctions, go to storagetreasures.com for great listings!
You can see Storage Wars now on the History channel (aka ‘History’):
http://www.history.co.uk/shows/storage-wars/about.html
But I think that is only available on Sky or cable