Space is getting tight in your office. Maybe the lease is up or the building is for sale and you’re seeking a new location. Or maybe you’re growing by leaps and bounds, and the space that once held a cabinet is now home to the new girl’s desk. Meanwhile, you are accumulating more stuff than ever, and you’re choking on boxes and office furniture that you won’t need for two years but can’t get rid of. To make matters worse, you’re also illuminating, heating, and cooling the space held by inanimate objects–and that doesn’t mean clueless temps.
Sound familiar? You’re not alone.
Even in this very e-oriented age, we still accumulate a good deal of hard copies and clutter. Business will always be that way. That’s despite our best efforts at paper reduction and shopping green.
That is the primary impact. As hard as we try to stay green, we do still use paper, and we do still have to keep paper. There are always several reams’ worth of information around the office that will never get hacked into quarter-pages and used for phone messages.
But there’s that secondary impact we’ve already considered, the one that starts with a “U” and ends with “tility bills”. We may already be committed to the quantity of office space we are using, meaning our space usage costs are set and sunk. So we are providing lighting and climate control for a given number of square feet no matter what is in there.
When we need more space for humans and can get it from the space being used for files, we can avoid upsizing our facilities. In that way, we can hang onto all the old files and data that we need without giving it a vote on the thermostat and the light switches.
This is especially important in hot areas, like a business located in Phoenix, AZ who tend to burn a lot of energy to keep things cool. I recommend renting self storage. Using a trusted self storage facility is a great way to improve the efficiency of your office.
Picture all the materials that you don’t use on a weekly or even monthly basis. Imagine that you can have unlimited 24/7 access to those materials without having it in your way during the thousands of work hours that it is not needed. Now picture how else you might re-purpose that space. Sound appealing?
Of course it does! So now is the time to make those plans. Review all the materials you’ve got stored on-site right now, and prioritize those who are like a loud, opinionated relative–something you value and sometimes need, but not something you want in the house every day. Then complete your triage and determine which things absolutely must stay with you and which ones can go to the roll-up unit with Uncle Hal.
It’s a laborious process, but when you can take a full office and mysteriously add space for three new workers without expanding, you’ll be glad you did. You’ll see a more attractive office that’s better utilized and far cheaper than one crammed full of cardboard boxes and plastic storage totes. Enjoy!
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