Which Storage Auction TV Show is Best?

When you fail to pay your storage dues, the companies you rent a unit from are forced to sell your belongings. Rather than go through each and every item looking for something of value, the companies put your storage space up for auction. Potential buyers are not allowed to step inside. Rather, they use flashlights and their own experience to decide (based on what they can see) what they think your unit may be worth. The highest bidder gets everything in the unit, and searches each unit for items of value.

This has become a recent hit formula for reality television. Within the past year, three different TV shows have been created focusing on the ins and outs of storage auctions, showcasing the potential treasures hidden within, and the disgusting junk that some people keep in storage lockers. Currently there are three shows that use this formula:

• Storage Wars on A&E; Network
• Storage Hunters on TruTV
• Auction Hunters on Spike

All three have received favorable ratings and have been renewed for another season. So which storage show is best? The pros and cons of each show are listed below.

• Storage Wars

Storage Wars is the most “reality” of the reality TV shows. It features four different buyers ‘” Dave Hester, Jarrod Schultz, Darrell Sheets, and Barry Weiss ‘” as they each bid on auctions for different reasons. Hester and Schultz each own thrift stores and need to keep products on the shelves. Sheets’ exact business is not known, but he deals in the more expensive items he finds and hands off the less expensive items to other businesses. Barry Weiss is an antiques collector and tends to purchase items for himself rather than selling them to others.

Pros

It’s clear these buyers are not actors. They’re all likable guys (except maybe Dave Hester, whose role on the show is the villain), and they all have well defined and genuine personalities that make them enjoyable to watch. One of the more interesting aspects of the show is that the units they buy may not have any items of value, meaning the viewer gets to see the risks associated with buying storage lockers.

At the end of each show, A&E; also recaps the “winners and losers” based on the total value in the items that they found against the amount they bid. The bidders all have their own conflicts, and occasionally find items that are very interesting, including items such as land yachts, trinkets made of rhinoceros horn, and other weird items. Also, Jarrod’s wife Brandi is extremely likeable.

Cons

The most frustrating aspect of the show is that how they calculate the winners and losers is unequal. Barry Weiss, for example, only keeps the items he wants. When Storage Wars decides who won the auction, they only include the items that Barry kept, ignoring the items that he threw away even if they have value. Also, sometimes they use the exact amount that the items sold for, while other times they trust whatever the bidder claimed it was worth (Dave Hester claimed that a box of 1970’s baseball cards was worth a couple of thousand dollars ‘” it most certainly is not, but A&E; gave him credit for it anyway). It would be nice to know the exact values that all the items are worth or sold for, and not necessarily take these buyers at their word.

• Storage Hunters

Storage Hunters stars Brandon and Lori Bernier. Unlike Storage Wars, Storage Hunters also focuses a considerable amount on Sean Kelly, the auctioneer. They travel around to different states (although they stay primarily in California), and while they don’t have any direct rivals on the show, they do occasionally war with various locals in ways that are highlighted by the show’s creators. The Bernier’s also research the locker owners before they bid, although it is not clear how they are able to complete that research.

Pros

Storage Hunters has more of a positive vibe than Storage Wars. The auctioneer is clearly supportive of the two leads, often walking into the storage locker with them after the auction is over, looking through it and supporting their decision to bid. They also often find items of some value, which does add some interest to the show. They’ve found some interesting items, like Mardi Gras sculpture heads, but nothing too interesting has been found thus far in this young show.

Cons

The main problem with this show is a problem that occurs with a lot of reality television ‘” everything sounds fake. The characters are far too excitable and energized, in a way that seems completely disingenuous. For a channel called “TruTV,” if it came out that the entire show was acting it wouldn’t be a surprise. They get into one of the most unrealistic fights on television in the episode “Bloody Battle.”

The show rushes to the contents of each locker too quickly, and spends too much time with the auctioneer, who isn’t that likeable a character. The auctioneer is also far too supportive for a show that is supposed to be reality. He heads into every locker and looks through them all with each bidder.

They also tend to win nearly every auction, which leads the viewer to believe that they are being supported far too strongly by the television station.

• Auction Hunters

Auction Hunters stars Allen Haff and Clinton Jones, two storage buyers from California. The show has a lot in common with Storage Hunters, as both only star the main buyers that go from auction to auction, purchasing storage lockers together without much competition.

Pros

Like Storage Hunters, the show tends to focus only on storage lockers where they find something of value. Unlike Storage Hunters, the show is well aware that they do this, and issues a disclaimer before the show begins that the buyers are not as successful as they appear on TV.

The items they do find tend to be more interesting than Storage Hunters, although this may be due to the fact that this show has more episodes to choose from. They also go through appraisals, which are perhaps the most interesting part of the show.

Cons

The way the show is edited is also less compelling than Storage Wars. Auction Hunters often gives away the value of the items before commercial breaks (causing it to lose some of the compelling nature), and ‘” once again ‘” uses buyers that act in ways that are unrealistic. Like Storage Hunters, the buyers seem like actors reading form a script most of the time, and don’t really have their own personality that they bring to the show.

Because they only show auctions where they find useful items, and they are the only buyers that are consistently on the show, there is very little conflict to give the show much drama.

Overall Thoughts

Of the three, Storage Wars seems to be the most compelling of the group. It’s the only show that seems “real,” with buyers that are interesting and lockers that may have nothing of value at all (improving the dramatic effect of the show, as the buyers can completely strike out on any given locker). Despite showing less valuable lockers, Storage Wars still manages to have more interesting items, and the show doesn’t seem to play an overt role in the way it plays out.

Auction Hunters and Storage Hunters are by no means bad shows, but they are not as compelling, as “reality,” or as likeable as Storage Wars. If you have to choose one storage locker show to watch, Storage Wars is probably your best bet.