What's in Your Storage Locker?

Kusha Navadar (0:10)

It's The Brian Lehrer Show, I'm Kusha Navadar filling in for Brian today here on WNYC. We're going to end the week with a bit of an existential question. Why can't Americans just let go of our old stuff, that is. The United States is the self-storage capital of the world with 90% of the entire world's self-storage capacity. New York City ranks number three for top cities for storage units. If you're curious, we're beat out by Dallas, Fort Worth and Houston, which makes sense. Everything is bigger in Texas. If you're not familiar and live blissfully under a minimalist rock, self-storage facility is a place you go to find a home for all the junk or important items you can actually keep in your home. Maybe it's old exercise equipment, seasonal clothes, a futon that you swear you'll find a place for eventually. You get your own key or passcode to your own personal little garage. It's usually air conditioned and hidden among a maze of hundreds of other identical looking units. It can feel a little existential walking those halls, going to grab your skis or looking at your grandmother's old dresser.

So why do we do this and how do we as a people keep accumulating stuff that we just can't let go of? Well, you tell us. Listeners, what are you holding on to in your storage units? Are you hoping you'll find a better home for your beloved junk, maybe with your kids or maybe on Facebook marketplace or maybe in a future bigger home? Call or text us at 212-433-WNYC.

I'm joined now by David Owen. He's a staff writer at The New Yorker and his latest piece is The American Religion of Self Storage Facilities. Hey, David, welcome back to WNYC.

David Owen (1:53)

Thank you very much.

Kusha Navadar (1:54)

So what started this fascination for you with storage units?

David Owen (1:59)

Mother turned 90 I took a field trip from Connecticut to Kansas City where she was, and I went all in back roads, no interstate. I was struck by how many self storage facilities I saw.

I just started thinking about it. I actually have a friend who owns a self storage facility, which he built in the early 90s, just before the industry really took off. And it's kind of an amazing business. He doesn't really have to do anything. He has one employee who's part time, and he built it in three phases. In the third phase, he added more of the largest units that he has, 10 by 30s, because people kept asking for bigger and bigger. And they store exactly the kind of things that you said for the most part. Just the stuff that we thought we wanted when we got it, and then realized we didn't have room for it.

Kusha Navadar (2:55)

Yeah, you interviewed people who work in self-storage, like you just mentioned. And I think something I took from what you wrote was that a lot of the, you described the four Ds that drive the industry. It's death, displacement, divorce, and downsizing, which is also kind of a downer, if I can add a D there. But you added your own fifth D, and you said delusion. I mean, the first four are pretty self-explanatory, but why did you feel like adding delusion to that list?

David Owen (3:24)

I think it was the delusion that your children will want anything you're planning to bequeath to them other than money. And I think this is often true. People will save things, oh, for my kids, and then learn that they don't want it, or they don't have room for it because they've already got all their own stuff. And I think recently, young people have been uninterested in what's known as brown or brown furniture, which people of my generation used to call antiques, but now it just looks old and stuffy. It's not mid-century modern. And my wife and I moved from a large house to a smaller house. We did it during COVID, so there was pretty much no way to get rid of anything. And it was especially difficult because both houses were filled with our stuff. So we had to get rid of a huge amount. And I had this idea that the kids would want lots and lots of stuff, but they really didn't want very much at all.

And a couple of things they wanted, I wouldn't have minded hanging on to, but I was so relieved that they wanted anything that I happily sent them on.

Kusha Navadar (4:25)

Yeah. Listeners, do you identify with any of those 5 Ds? Tell us about your storage units, what you use them for, whether or not you think they're a temporary fix or a permanent fixture. Give us a call or send us a text. We're at 212-433-WNYC.