What Can You Store in Drive-Up Units at b.Mac’s Self Storage in Des Moines?

The question is not really what fits in a drive up unit. Almost anything fits, the same way almost anything fits in a garage. The real question is whether drive up access actually helps with what you are storing, or whether you are paying for a feature that only matters for some items and not others. b.Mac's Self Storage on NW 2nd Street in Des Moines rents both drive up and climate controlled units, and the honest answer depends on how often you need back into the unit and what you are protecting it from.

At a Glance

Drive up units at this location suit anything loaded with a vehicle or dolly and accessed more than once or twice a season, including furniture during a move, contractor equipment, and retail inventory.

Items sensitive to temperature swings over months, like electronics, documents, or wood furniture in long term storage, generally do better in climate controlled storage instead of a drive up unit.

How Often You Will Actually Get Back Into the Unit

This is the question that should decide drive up versus interior storage, more than what the item is. A household move usually means loading everything once, then not touching the unit again until move out day months later. For that pattern, drive up access mostly saves effort on the two days that matter most: the day boxes and furniture go in, and the day they come back out. A contractor pulling tools and materials out several times a week has a completely different math. For that renter, drive up access removes a hallway, an elevator, or a long walk from every single trip, which adds up fast over a busy season. The same logic applies to a retailer restocking a storefront from inventory kept in a unit. If the unit gets opened weekly or more, drive up access is doing real work every time. If it gets opened twice, the difference between drive up and interior storage barely registers.

What Moves Well Into a Drive Up Unit During a Household Move

Large furniture, mattresses, and major appliances are the clearest case for drive up storage during a move. A couch or a refrigerator loaded straight off a moving truck through a roll up door avoids the awkward maneuvering that comes with narrow interior hallways or a shared elevator, and that matters most for anything heavy or oddly shaped that two people are carrying by hand. Boxed household items are less picky about access type on their own, but if they are being loaded at the same time as the furniture, drive up still saves a second trip type for the same move. The tradeoff shows up on the other side of the transaction: a household move usually only needs that access once or twice, so a renter storing boxed items alone with no bulky furniture involved may not notice much difference between a drive up unit and an interior one, and could reasonably choose based on price or availability instead.

Business and Contractor Storage Where Access Frequency Changes Everything

Contractors storing tools, ladders, and field equipment are the strongest case for drive up storage in this market. Loading a truck for an early job site departure through a roll up door, with no interior corridor to navigate, is the entire reason drive up units exist for this use case. b.Mac's commercial storage options extend this to retail inventory and e commerce sellers who need to restock a storefront or pack orders from stored stock, sometimes several times a week. For a business storing records or supplies that get accessed rarely, the calculation shifts back toward whatever unit type is available and appropriately priced, since infrequent access does not lean heavily on drive up convenience the way daily or weekly restocking does.

Seasonal Gear, RVs, and Watercraft: A Different Kind of Frequent Access

Seasonal gear does not get accessed constantly, but it gets accessed at predictable, high stakes moments. A boat needs to come out fast on a summer morning headed for Saylorville Lake, not after fifteen minutes of navigating a facility's interior. Snowblowers, lawn equipment, and holiday decorations follow the same pattern at the household scale: infrequent access, but access that needs to happen without friction when the season actually arrives. This is where drive up access earns its value even for things that spend ten months a year sitting untouched, because the two or three times it matters, it matters a lot. RVs and larger watercraft specifically need the roll up door clearance and straight in access that drive up units provide, since forcing a trailer through anything resembling an interior corridor is not realistic at most facility layouts.

When Interior or Climate Controlled Storage Is Actually the Better Call

Drive up access mostly does not help, and can work against, anything sensitive to Iowa's temperature and humidity swings over a full storage term. Wood furniture, electronics, photographs, important documents, and musical instruments are the clearest examples: a unit that opens directly to outside air, even briefly during loading, is not the source of the risk, but a drive up unit at this facility is not climate controlled the way b.Mac's dedicated climate controlled units are, and the difference compounds over months rather than days. Anyone storing a mix of both types, bulky furniture that suits drive up and sensitive electronics that do not, should consider whether two smaller units of different types make more sense than one unit that compromises on both. That question is specific enough to be worth a call to the office rather than guessing, since the right answer depends on exactly what is being stored and for how long.

Matching the Decision to What You Are Actually Storing

The pattern across all of this is the same: drive up access pays off in proportion to how often the unit gets opened and how bulky or awkward the items are to carry by hand. It pays off less, or not at all, for anything stored once and left alone, and it can actively work against anything sensitive to temperature and humidity swings over a long storage term. A renter unsure which category they fall into can reserve online or check with b.Mac's Self Storage directly, and anyone specifically storing a vehicle, boat, or trailer rather than household or business goods should look at the facility's dedicated RV, car, and boat storage page, since vehicle storage has its own sizing and access considerations beyond what a general drive up unit covers.

Ready to reserve a unit? Compare drive up and climate controlled options at b.Mac's Self Storage in Des Moines online, or call the office to talk through which fits what you are actually storing before you book.