Extra Space Storage is thrilled to celebrate the one-year anniversary of the launch of Rapid Rental—a technology solution allowing customers to complete self storage rentals entirely online. Early in 2020, it was evident that expanding customers’ ability to self-serve online would be critical. As a result, teams at Extra Space Storage went to work making it possible for customers to reserve storage, buy insurance, and sign a lease agreement all online for a completely contactless experience.

“Driven by a quickly changing landscape and a need to deliver more ways for our customers to interact with us, many teams, including IT, Marketing, Product, Operations, and others rallied together to scope, build, and launch Rapid Rental in record time,” David Elswood, Product Manager at Extra Space Storage, said in a thank you letter to team members.

Since the launch in August 2020, Rapid Rental has accounted for an astounding 200,000 rentals. This equates to nearly a quarter of all rentals in the Extra Space Storage portfolio over the last year. One concern when launching a product for online transactions without the personal touch and expertise of a live person was the customer experience. Storage leasing can be quite complex. But not only does the number of online rentals speak for itself, customer satisfaction scores have also remained consistently high.

“The success of this product thus far is incredible to talk about, and all the amazing talent we have in the business driving this forward cannot be thanked enough,” Elswood continued. “Just because we have a world-class product doesn’t mean we will stop our work on innovating and making the product an even better customer experience.”

The Extra Space Storage Product team recently launched a simplified version of lease agreements, currently in a pilot phase, and have plans for future innovations, making it easier for customers to interact with the company.

“We would like to thank everyone who has been involved in Rapid Rental, and we are excited to see this product continue to evolve in the future, eventually achieving our ultimate goal of making it easier for customers to rent with us and provide a superior customer experience,” Elswood added.

Extra Space Storage was a recipient of the 2021 CIO 100 Awards for the successful implementation of Rapid Rental.