These analog lines are actually enabling some pretty critical systems for safety at our locations. So we have anything from fire panels to elevators and just really critical safety devices that need POTS services.
But we knew that there was probably a better way to approach it, which at one point we had over 75 telecom carriers that my team was managing, thousands of POTS lines over thousands of locations, and we just didn’t have the visibility that we needed to really do a good job managing that.
First of all, the cost savings have been substantial, and that’s something that’s been really important to us as we lower our cost per store and become more efficient. But what I’m most proud of is just the increase in reliability and visibility. We have new tools that our team’s able to understand what’s happening on our network, to be able to troubleshoot issues that might come up. And it’s just much easier to manage a portfolio of 4,000 locations when you have the right solution and tools and systems to manage it.
When we were initially looking for a partner, we knew we needed a partner that could work on a national scale, like Extra Space, and with the number of locations we have and the footprint that we have. We had worked with some other providers in the past, and they weren’t able to meet our requirements or our complexity.
We have almost 8,000 mobile devices now that we have with MetTel in one program and consolidated. That just makes it easier for my team to manage, but it also has driven a lot of cost savings as well.
We have some locations where internet is not very available to us. It’s maybe hard to get serviceability, and Starlink has changed the way that we’re able to deploy internet to some of those types of locations.
The collaboration is a big part of why we’ve been successful. When we first started looking at this initiative, we knew that we needed some outside help. Starlink’s been a really big game changer for us. We’ve had, like I mentioned earlier, locations where traditional internet just might not be an option. And so we were on LTE services that’s really expensive and sometimes inconsistent. Starlink provides a really predictable service level for us and a predictable cost.
