Commentary
Few things better exemplify the extravagance of the consumer economy than the rise of the self-storage industry. The idea of stashing one’s treasured possessions in secure places dates back centuries, from underground storage pits in ancient China to cellars in medieval Europe. But the business of self-storage as we know it arose in the United States during the 1950s and 1960s, when entrepreneurs started building managed facilities where consumers could rent individual storage units on a monthly basis.
