Author: Ojai Self Storage

Earth Day is Friday April 22, 2016, and in lieu of this green day here are 10 easy ways to reduce, recycle, and reuse:

1. Reusable bags and containers – Use these every chance you can! Shopping, traveling, lunches, picnics, even around the house! The less you use plastic bags, the better it is for the environment.

2. Avoid Single-Serve Items – Many items in the grocery stores are packaged with snack packs or single serve items which leads to excess garbage. Try buying these items in bulk and packaging them in recyclable containers to alleviate excess and unnecessary garbage.

3. Compost Food & Yard Waste— If you don’t have a compost bin, we highly recommend you get one! Many food scraps and yard waste can be tossed into a compost bin in the backyard. This reduces waste in the landfill and yields free, nutrient-rich fertilizer for your garden.

4. Go Paperless – There are a lot of options nowadays to go paperless, such as bank statements and other bills. This helps reduce the amount of paper used and ultimately saves our trees.

5. Buy Rechargeable Batteries – The lifespan of one rechargeable battery can equal that of countless regular batteries, and it is better for the environment. When you can, be sure to use rechargeable batteries. Don’t forget, once a battery is no longer working, you can recycle them!

6. Place Recycle Bins Everywhere!— When recycle bins aren’t accessible, people will often toss recyclable items in the trash. Take a few minutes to add a recycling bin where they are most likely to be used. A paper bin in the office, for example, will help recycling efforts tremendously.

7.  Buy Recycled-Content Items— Many food items are packaged with recycled content so that you can use and re-use them. Similar, many consumer items are made of recycled content such as green toys products and moving comfort active wear. Wherever you can, buy items that incorporate recycled materials into their packaging.

8.  Re-use the used—Used items can be re-used or donated. You can re-use empty boxes and containers for storage and unwanted items such as books, clothing, accessories, technology, can be donated to charity or local library.

9. Borrow and Share from Family and Friends— Sometimes if we just reach out to others, we can collectively share items such as tools, sports equipment, tables and chairs, or other items that would need to be rented. Communal sharing helps the environment in the long run.

10. Avoid using Disposable Items—Avoid using disposable items such as plastic and paper plates and instead use regular plates and utensils. The disposable items are manufactured in ways that increase unneeded trash!

For the best storage in Ojai, CA, Ojai Self Storage is the perfect location to store all your belongings in self storage. Staff is friendly and helpful, and they offer all important amenities needed for safe and secure storage. Call Ojai Self Storage today for more information at (805) 646-8742. Or visit the website at (https://ojaiselfstorage.com/).

Spring is at our doorstep and that means the time has come for Spring Cleaning! Spring Cleaning is that tradition we’ve all grown up with where we spend a week or two extensively cleaning out our homes: pulling everything out of our drawers and tossing what we don’t need, dusting every nook and cranny, shampooing our furniture and carpets, extensively organizing our closets, we’ve all been there! It can be daunting before beginning, but once we all go underway in our Spring Cleaning, we find that we feel reenergized and refreshed!

Here are some great tips that will help you in Spring Cleaning:

1. Clean your Garbage Disposal—This is the one thing people tend to forget in their annual cleanings! You can drop in some household cleaners and run the water and disposal to let it circulate, or for a more natural remedy, put in the lemon squeeze with salt and run the garbage disposal with cold water so that it can work to clear away the residue and eliminate odor.

2.  Degrease the Microwave – Microwave stains that build up are sometimes difficult to get rid of. It’s also hard to let things soak in there so one method outside of regular cleaning agents is to use lemon juice mixed with water and a bit of salt to clean the residue. The acid of the lemon helps to break it down and makes it easier to scrub.

3. Wax On Wax Off –  I heard this from a mechanic  who uses the same method as his house: after you clean your stovetop, put a little bit of car wax and buff it in as it helps with the aesthetic, the coat, and makes future spills easier to clean off.

4.  Lemon & Salt Clears Rust – Lemons and other citruses are natural cleaning agents one effective way to clear rust. Just sprinkle salt and put lemon juice on the rust stain, let it sit and scrub every ten minutes and the acid will tear through the rust. After an hour, rinse and the rust stain should be gone!

5.  Clean the Fridge’s Coils – You know the condenser coils, it’s in the back of the fridge and we all wish we can ignore it but without cleaning it annually, we risk the fridge overheating. Pull out your fridge and use a vacuum or a long dust brush to get all the lint, dust, and muck from behind there in order to preserve the lifespan of your refrigerator!

6.  Bathe your Walls – When periodically cleaning our homes, we tend not to clean our walls. We focus on the floors and surface tops but the walls need a bath at least once a year. There is enough dirt and soot that clings to the walls and a simple sponge with dishwasher detergent can do the trick. Using a sponge mop can make the process go faster while getting at hard-to-reach places.

7. Light Cleaning, pun intended – Even the lights need their spring cleaning! If you use a sponge and all-purpose cleaner agent, or a polish cloth, you can clean the lights and dust off the soot which will help in preserving the integrity of the light in form and luminosity.

8. Microwave your sponge – Every time you need to disinfect your sponge, squeeze out all of the water and place it in the microwave for 1 minute to kill all the germs. This little trick will save you on having to constantly replace your sponge! For the rest of the year, it’s recommended to replace your sponge every month!

9. Clean Out the Coat Closet – One sweater and one light jacket is all you really need in most climates so go ahead and clean out your coat closet and donate whatever you don’t wear to your local Goodwill or homeless shelter!

10. Clean those Ceiling Fan Blades – The ceiling fan blades collect dust very quickly and if they’re not cleaned often, the fan could help spread the dust when on, which can aid in allergies and sinus infections. There are specially designed long-handle dust sweepers and brooms that help with cleaning the fan blades. You could also climb up a step-ladder to hand wash them but make sure to be careful when you and follow all safety precautions!

For the best storage in Ojai, CA, Ojai Self Storage is the perfect location to store all your belongings in self storage. Staff is friendly and helpful, and they offer all important amenities needed for safe and secure storage. Call Ojai Self Storage today for more information at (805) 646-8742. Or visit the website at (https://ojaiselfstorage.com/).

It’s that rainy season again and sometimes we find that we have to pack or unpack a storage unit under such conditions. Many storage facilities have built-in drains to facilitate the water away from the doors, which is extremely helpful, and here are a few ideas to best help with such a scenario:

**Hand cart, Dolly … Wheel it all at once! A lot of facilities have hand carts and dollies for tenant use, you just have to ask the manager! This helps immensely with moving in rain or shine, but above all when having to move in and out in the rain. Put them all on the dolly or hand carts and cover them when wheeling to and from your vehicle.

** Tarps. Tarps are the best method to completely protect your items from the rain and they are reasonably priced at local hardware stores. Cover up all items before wheeling them out into the rain and they’ll stay dry.

** Rent a unit you can drive up next to, that way you can access the unit during the wet season and not have to worry too largely about getting your items wet. Look for a unit that has drive up access instead of a hallway.

**Cloth / old sheet.  Cover your items with old clothes, old sheets, old towels, anything old that you can use to cover your items and protect them from the rain and water damage!

** Waterproof Plywood sheets.    Placing the waterproof plywood sheets on the ground can help with moving in and out, especially if you can’t have a dolly or a hand cart and you want to make sure that your items do not come in contact with the wet ground.

**Wear Rain clothes/ Warm Clothes.  Wearing appropriate attire is nearly half the battle when loading and unloading in the rain. You don’t want to risk getting soaking wet when loading or unloading a unit!

**Bring an Umbrella Large umbrellas can help cover smaller items as you carry them in and out of the unit, while also keeping you dry!

For the best storage in Ojai, CA, Ojai Self Storage is the perfect location to store all your belongings in self storage. Staff is friendly and helpful, and they offer all important amenities needed for safe and secure storage. Call Ojai Self Storage today for more information at (805) 646-8742. Or visit the website at (https://ojaiselfstorage.com/).

2016 brings a new year and with all new years, there are exciting and endless possibilities! The world is our oyster! With the new year comes new resolutions and sticking to the resolutions is definitely a year’s effort!

One common New Year’s resolution is to become more organized at home. This could be remedied by placing unused items into storage. A lot of times we discover that we have important items that we store in our home that are taking up much-needed space, but that we hardly ever use. Family heirlooms are one great example. Another great example is old toys and items from growing children that are too sentimental to part with. Placing these items into self-storage units could free up space in the home to refine the organization.

Self-storage allows for peace of mind because the items are stored safely and can be accessed year-round. And having the extra space in the house will make it feel like your home is bigger. You can Feng Shui your home and make it feel brand new for the new year!

A great tip is that small, closet sized units are very affordable and a great way to store items, including holiday and seasonal items, that are only needed at specific times in the year. Ojai Self Storage has closet-sized units starting at under $63 per month for convenient and affordable storage. For more information on self storage in Ojai, CA call Ojai Self Storage at (805) 646-8742. Or visit the website at (https://ojaiselfstorage.com/).

by Paul Reynolds on SelfStorAll

So you need a place to store your things, but before you start investigating your options, ask yourself the following questions:

• Do I need all this stuff?
• If I got rid of some of this stuff, would I really miss them?
• When was the last time I used it? (If you can’t answer this, you should probably chuck it!)
• Does it have any sentimental or monetary value? Will this value increase with time?

The next question is what are you storing? Items such as wine, boats and vehicles all require special storage. Or if you’re storing valuable papers, you may want to ask about Heated and dry storage. Heated storage does cost more but will prevent temperature changes from damaging your belongings. So, determine which items will be stored, take inventory, make a list and have this information ready when you start calling storage companies.

Now that you know how much and what kind of stuff you’ll have to store, you need to determine the size of storage unit you will require. The information provided in this chart is pretty standard for most companies, although most companies can accommodate what you need by rearranging moveable walls.

• 5 x 5  = Small items, boxes, sports gear
• 5 x 10  = Small 1 bedroom apartment or motorcycle and gear
• 10 x 10 = 1 bedroom home
• 10 x 15 = 2-3 bedroom home
• 10 x 20 = 3-4 bedroom home
• 10 x 30 = 5 bedroom home