Stor-Age group head of IT, Schalk Lesch, shares how he went from finance to IT and how he is leveraging technology in the booming self-storage industry.
Established in 2006, Stor-Age has grown from one self-storage facility in Cape Town to 107 across both South Africa and the UK. Locally, they redefined the industry, and in the UK, grew their brand ‘Storage King’ to become the fifth largest operator in the country.
CIO South Africa recently spoke to Stor-Age’s group head of ICT, Schalk Lesch, who unveiled insights into the company’s journey and the impressive level of technology that is interwoven throughout the business.
“You’ll notice that Stor-Age properties are not your traditional rows of garages that were the norm in the 1990s and early 2000s,” says Schalk. “Each of our properties are built bearing in mind not only our customers’ needs, but also feature a deep level of technology, whether that be with access control systems, ICT, security or environmental sustainability initiatives.”
“Location is key for us, and we understood early on that our customers don’t want to drive to the outskirts of town and leave their prized possessions in a facility that is lacking in key security features. To achieve this, our founders (who are still the company executives today) spent a great deal of time in international markets developing a firm understanding of what a world-class self storage facility really looked like. As they say, the rest is history,” he continues.
Stor-Age, a JSE-listed company operates over 100 properties across both South Africa and the UK. According to Schalk, it all came down to a simple vision – to become the best self-storage business in the world.
“Our mission is to rent space and to solve people's space needs. Our clients range from residential customers who are moving home, to large businesses who are looking for an extension of their logistics network. It ultimately comes down to ‘life happens’ moments, such as getting married, having kids, studying or retiring. On the commercial customer side, a significant portion of our customers are small businesses that are either starting out or looking to grow,” he says.
“Our stores become a key part of their business, whether that be an e-commerce start-up looking to hold stock or distribute to buyers, or those looking for a low-cost, one-stop business storage shop. We even have customers who work directly from their units, combining the convenience of secure storage with the need for traditional office space. We call this micro-warehousing and it’s really taken off with some of our competitors even adopting this term,” Schalk adds
From finance to IT
Schalk joined Stor-Age in 2009 in its budding years as a financial controller in the accounts department, not long after it was founded by two South African brothers, Gavin and Stephen Lucas, and a friend Steven Horton, in 2006.
“We’d just opened our fourth store – so we were very small at the time and accounting was a key focus, along with our IT infrastructure.”
Between 2011 and 2012, Stor-Age acquired a portfolio of stores which saw it doubling the portfolio in a single transaction. The expansion required a focus on IT, resulting in Schalk leaving accounting to start the IT department from the ground up, which he describes as designing the network.
“As you can imagine, as a small business in the early days a lot of things were Excel-based,” he recalls, fondly narrating how far the business has come. With no legacy IT infrastructure, Schalk says this was “a blessing and a curse” that enabled fresh, innovative ideas, but required more convincing to justify major spending decisions.
“It was a blank canvas. But it was also a struggle in that there were no peers in the network or in the organisation at that stage. Every spend had to be justified and motivated,” he says, reflecting on how he had to often motivate and prove the return on investment for IT infrastructure – which was often cloud-based – where its value was not always immediately or physically visible to executive management.
Leading with a culture of trust
As group head of ICT, company culture is important to Schalk, which he says is crucial in fostering collaboration and driving innovation.
“Luckily, we’ve got a very good company culture and a very flat structure. It’s probably why I’ve been with Stor-Age for so long. There’s not a lot of egos,” he adds. The open-plan offices with an open-door policy encourages teamwork and a sociable atmosphere where departments don't work in silos.
Schalk believes in appointing the right people for the job and giving them the autonomy to excel rather than micromanaging.
“Our biggest assets are our staff, we believe. They are the ones making the difference,” he says.
How does Schalk stay ahead of the ICT game? He enjoys tackling tech-related challenges, which often leads him to searching for solutions from different sources.
“The fun part for me is to go and find what is out there. I find, though, that if you don’t have a purpose or a reason to research tech, it becomes very convoluted,” he says. “As a team we are constantly watching the trends and investigating new and exciting tech entering the scene.”
He thrives on the challenge of uncovering innovative solutions – whether by being “clever with some code” to tackle tech-related problems, diving into books and research, or drawing inspiration from podcasts.
Some of his favourite podcasts include The AI Use Cases Podcast and Reply All, which he listens to whenever he finds the time – sometimes while stuck in traffic.
99% Invisible also tops his go-to podcast list, which highlights how the most effective technologies often go unnoticed – working quietly in the background.
“It might be architecture, or a specific system that nobody realises is there, but it's because it works so well. If people can spot the system, then it's not doing its thing. It kind of needs to be in the background,” he adds.
To stay up to date with the latest developments at Microsoft, a key provider of software used at Stor-Age, Schalk tunes into various podcasts focused on Microsoft and its products. “Then there’s another one,” he says. “It’s a bit dramatic sometimes, but it's called Darknet Diaries, and it's to do with cyber security, but more about the kind of naughty things people get up to, you know, dark web type stuff. So this is for a little bit of entertainment,” he says, with a chuckle.
Admitting that he gathers valuable nuggets of insight from various aspects of his life, he says among his favourite books are Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek – which he says informs his management style – The Phoenix Project: A Novel about IT, DevOps, and Helping Your Business Win by Gene Kim, Making it Right: Product Management for a Startup World by Rian van der Merwe, and The Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton Christensen.
Whether solving tech challenges or securing valuable assets for families and businesses at Stor-Age, Schalk's greatest priority remains his own family, with whom he spends most of his free time. “I’m a family guy. I’ve got two boys and am married to a beautiful woman.”
