3 Ways to Boost Efficiency in your Vehicle Storage Lot

Vehicle storage lots, whether they are impound lots, true storage lots, or even large auto mechanic garages, all face the same problem — storing a lot of cars in a limited amount of space. This brings up a variety of issues that affect your vehicle storage lot’s efficiency: shuffling around a bunch of cars to get one out takes time, finding the right set of keys for the right car can be a nightmare, and sometimes the cars on your lot won’t start in the first place. 

It can be difficult to look at all of these challenges and see solutions. While you might not be able to solve all of these problems at once, there are plenty of small improvements you can make to gradually improve how you do business, and eventually boost the profitability of your vehicle storage lot. We’ve outlined three of the most accessible ways to boost efficiency in your vehicle storage lot below:

Parking Lot Design

One of the best ways to boost the overall efficiency of your vehicle storage lot, whether you’ve got an auto garage or an impound lot, is to take a close look at the design of your parking lot. In nearly every situation, the more vehicles you can fit on your lot in a safe, organized fashion, the better chances you have at increasing both efficiency and productivity.

In the past, it was common to just paint parking lot lines wherever they’d fit, with general guidelines for the space of each parking spot. Today, there are plenty of specific resources out there to help you maximize your parking lot to fit the most cars in, safely. Here are a few options:

• You can designate a number of spots for smaller, compact cars while leaving a specific section for just larger vehicles. Since compact cars don’t need as much space in a parking spot as trucks, you can add in quite a few additional spots this way.
• You can also take a look at the numbers — check out this parking space guide from the University of Idaho. Most passenger vehicles fall into a few standard sizes, widths, and lengths. Optimizing your parking spaces to fit those specific numbers can save you a lot of space, and make your vehicle storage lot much more efficient.
• Another consideration to make is angled parking spots. Often, you can fit more and longer cars into smaller spaces by implementing angled parking.

No matter what you decide, if you’re looking for ways to boost efficiency in your vehicle storage lot, it’s always a good idea to start by looking at the way your lot is organized. The simpler and more accessible its design, the easier it will be for employees to locate and maneuver vehicles around the lot. Plus, redesigning your lot is as simple as just repainting parking space lines the next time you have your lot resurfaced. 

Vehicle Management Software

With an efficient vehicle storage lot design, you’re more easily able to integrate vehicle management software that can seriously improve how you store vehicles. While software doesn’t always make sense for smaller auto mechanic garages, if you have an impound lot or a vehicle storage center, vehicle management software can seriously reduce the time spent searching for and shuffling around vehicles to extricate the right one. 

Vehicle management software works to categorize every vehicle on your lot. It saves information about where each vehicle is parked, why it’s on your lot, and when it’s coming off the lot. With this information at your fingertips, you can easily optimize how you park each vehicle to minimize shuffling when you need to remove it and save your employees time finding cars that need to be moved.

On-Site Towing Equipment

This article found that the Colorado Springs municipal impound lot spent $65,000 in 2017 on tow fees just to move vehicles across their lot. That’s not including any tow fees incurred picking up vehicles and moving them to the impound lot — those are just fees associated with moving vehicles across their lot. 

If your vehicle storage lot or impound facility faces the same problem, it’s worth it to invest in on-site towing equipment, which you can purchase at a fraction of that yearly towing expense, and maintain for year-over-year returns. 

The Forklift Wrecker, for example, comes at a low investment cost of $2,500 and is easily installed on any forklift. Since the Forklift Wrecker is compact and easily maneuverable, you don’t have to worry about pulling vehicles from tight parking spaces or backing a huge wrecker into a dead-end parking lot. 

Not only does on-site towing equipment like the Forklift Wrecker save you money in towing fees, but it also improves the overall efficiency of your vehicle storage lot. You don’t have to worry about finding keys to vehicles or trying to jump their batteries — you can simply tow them safely wherever they need to go, without any additional time spent or hassle. 

If you’re looking for ways to make your vehicle storage lot more efficient, the team here at Forklift Wrecker would love to help. Our equipment is affordable, easy to use, and well-loved by vehicle storage lots across the country. Give us a call at 877-593-6959 or view our features guide to learn more!

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