Joe Shoen has had enough.
The CEO of U-Haul, along with his son Stuart, executive vice president of U-Haul, and daughter Royal, vice president of aviation at U-Haul, recently sat down to talk with MSM about the ongoing beef with Public Storage over the color orange.
As we reported on our website news and exclusives, Public Storage has demanded that U-Haul discontinue use of the color orange on its doors, exteriors, and signage, as well as in marketing and promotional material. U-Haul has fired back, filing a complaint in the U.S. District Court of Arizona against Public Storage. The action is not seeking a payday or damages; it’s simply asking Public Storage to drop their pursuit of an orange trademark, in turn protecting the right of U-Haul (and every other self-storage facility) to use the color orange.
The complaint further states that Public Storage’s founder Wayne Hughes has previously admitted to using orange to draw an association with U-Haul in order to attract customers. The idea that U-Haul has to defend its use of the color, especially considering it has been using it since 1945, more than 25 years before the first Public Storage ever opened, doesn’t sit well with Joe. Now, he's fighting back for U-Haul, its independent dealers, and “all the little guys.”
Although the Public Storage dispute is the order of the day, mentioning the year 1945 takes Joe on a brief detour. “That’s when my mom and dad started U-Haul, right when the war ended,” he recalls. The company was famously founded by Leonard and Anna Mary Carty Shoen, who at one time could not find a rental trailer for a one-way move, forcing them to buy a trailer. This was the aha moment that gave birth to U-Haul, which the Shoens began in Portland, Ore., before uprooting the business and headquartering in Phoenix, Ariz. “So, U-Haul has been a family business from day one. And today, I have three of my children working here [his other son, Sam, runs the U-Box program]. While I don’t insist they work at U-Haul, I encourage it,” he says with a smile.
“I think us being family-focused probably aligns us with a lot of your readers, many of whom are running their own family businesses,” Joe adds, noting that when he attends storage events, he’s always being introduced to someone’s child who’s now part of the operations side of things. “U-Haul always gets classed with the REITs, but they’re big finance people, while we’re more operations focused,” which is why he feels a bit of a kinship with the smaller operators.
In Messenger’s “2025 Self-Storage Outlook,” the other feature in this issue, some industry experts cautioned developers looking to build, calling it potentially risky. Joe is more optimistic than that. “I’m bullish on self-storage,” he says firmly. “Of course, some markets are overbuilt, and that can happen when there’s a temporary frenzy in a hot spot, but there’s still a lot of room to grow in the storage business, and I encourage anyone who wants to build to do it.”
Joe goes on to say, “When they do build, they can expect to get a call from us asking if they want to be a U-Haul dealer. It can help new owners get their place started, and if they’re not interested, we just wish them well. We want everyone to do well.”
Of course, Joe acknowledges that times are tough. “Development is expensive, construction costs are up, zoning can be difficult. But you’ve got to work through these things one at a time. Dial some of those construction costs back if you can, for example. Just keep working at it until it makes sense.”
He also feels that self-storage will continue to innovate. “Storage has been around a lot longer than most people think,” explains Joe. “It just wasn’t ‘self-storage.’ There were always storage warehouses, unbranded buildings with belongings stacked floor-to-ceiling, but everything was handled by a third party. What happened next was self-storage, which involved handling your own goods. It’s a much better business model and obviously, people have embraced it.”
Joe adds, “Every time the industry ups its game, consumers respond favorably.”
How does Joe feel about the trend toward remote management? “Remote shouldn’t mean no one is ever there,” he states. “Remote is about giving people more self-service options. Maybe it offers the owner a little more profit margin and the customer a little lower cost.”
“Also for the customer, more benefits,” adds Stuart. “For example, 24/7 access.”
“We have some facilities that operate this way, and we’ve learned a lot of lessons along the way,” says Joe. “I think Jefferson Shreve [the founder of Storage Express who recently won a seat in Indiana’s 6th Congressional District] is really responsible for making the whole concept work. He spent time with us about 10 years ago and showed us the ropes of ‘remote.’ What I remember most is him saying, ‘It’s more difficult than it may seem,’ and he was right. We’re getting better at dialing things in, but again, there has to be some staff around. Completely unmanned, in my experience, is not a good solution.”
Speaking of the future, what’s next for U-Haul? “Portable storage,” Joe answers, without missing a beat.
U-Box, U-Haul’s moving and storage hybrid, has been growing quickly over the last few years. U-Boxes can be kept on someone’s property temporarily or stored in U-Haul’s secure warehouses until renters are ready to pick them up or have them delivered. It’s a natural fit for U-Haul, which people have come to associate with both moving and storage. “That’s why we have 5,000 independent self-storage facilities using our trucks,” Joe says. “Of course, PODS has been a big player in portables for years, and they’re great at what they do, but they’re more industrial. Our U-Boxes are designed around household goods, with nice interiors so things won’t get banged up. We like to say U-Box is like the Door Dash of moving and storage. It’s a great convenience, and while it costs a little premium, people are willing to pay for that convenience factor.”
Another reason the company is betting on U-Box is the issue of vehicle electrification. “At the end of the day, trucks are going to burn a lot of gas. You get more fuel efficiency transporting six to 10 U-Boxes across the country than individuals driving six to 10 trucks.”
Joe believes U-Box will be even more popular in Canada with its vast expanses. “An 800-mile truck rental is not uncommon in Canada,” says Joe. “In fact, we serve the maritime providences, and that can be a 6,000-mile drive. U-Box is so much more economical in these cases. I’m confident it’s going to do great up north.”
If there’s one constant, it’s that you can expect, following a devastating storm, wildfire, or any other catastrophe, that U-Haul will be there offering 30 days of free storage at participating U-Haul self-storage facilities on an as-available basis. The company also provides U-Box rentals when available.
“When people are in a jam, when there’s a disaster, our heart goes out to them,” says Joe. “We don’t want their money. We’ve got the space, so we let them have it. And who knows , maybe they’ll remember us some day down the road when they need a moving truck or storage.”
“Plus, it’s just the right thing to do,” adds Royal. “Helping within the community is important to us.”
U-Haul works directly with the American Red Cross, the military, and local police and fire departments in their efforts to get much-needed relief supplies to areas affected by natural disasters. The company became an official Red Cross Disaster Responder in 2015. The partnership allows the Red Cross access to U-Haul’s range of resources including equipment, storage, and easily reachable U-Haul locations with an infrastructure encompassing 50 states and 10 Canadian provinces.
So back to the dispute with Public Storage. Unbeknownst to many, this has been going on behind the scene for quite a while. “[Public Storage] started this about four years ago,” says Joe. “We tried to talk with them numerous times, but effectively got the brush off. It got to the point where we had no choice but to file a complaint and hope a federal district judge will make a common sense decision.”
The complaint states that U-Haul believes Public Storage has “engaged in a multi-faceted and corrupt campaign to wrongfully appropriate rights in the use of the color and word ‘orange’ in connection with self-storage services and to assert such rights against U-Haul, its sister companies, its dealers, and licensees.”
“Orange is a standard color in self-storage,” says Joe. “Claiming exclusive rights to the color, whether on doors, buildings, or marketing materials is egregious; if they can get a registration, they’ll enforce it and everyone, not just U-Haul, is going to have to change. A small operator with 500 unit doors? You’re going to have to pay to replace or repaint them. That is going to be an expensive undertaking.”
To support the notion that orange is a general self-storage color and not a color only associated with Public Storage, U-Haul has turned over to the court evidence of at least 800 self-storage operators that use the color orange on their doors. “That’s just what we’ve gathered in a few weeks,” Joe explains. “I believe there are many, many more.”
Here is a look at just some of the orange-colored facilities that U-Haul has included as evidence.
A quick search of stock photography also confirms the prevalence of the color orange within the industry; there are hundreds of stock photos showing orange doors and buildings–none of which are specific to Public Storage.
U-Haul’s complaint further states that Public Storage is so determined to monopolize the color and/or the term “orange” that it has fabricated use of trademarks containing the word and knowingly filed fraudulent evidence of trademark use with the USPTO. As evidence, U-Haul has turned over examples of website pages in which Public Storage retroactively added slogans and marks centered around the word and color orange to existing pages, captured images of it, and then removed them. “It was only done to tell the judge they’d used it, but it was there for maybe four weeks,” states Joe. “They’ve also clearly been manipulating Wikipedia and AI so that orange appears to be attributed only to Public Storage. It’s all so dishonest, and I don’t think it’s wise to fib to the judge.”
Stuart speaks up on his father’s behalf. “Joe tries to be a good ambassador of the industry,” he says. “He’s looking out for everyone by doing this. We believe competition is healthy; it raises people’s games and makes them better. To try to take this color away from everyone else, that’s just picking a fight and playing unfairly.”
“U-Haul alone has 5,000 dealers who are also self-storage operators. These aren’t big operations, maybe one to three facilities. They aren’t in a position to fight this, and neither are the other little guys. So we are. Someone’s got to stop this.”
Circling back to the court case, Joe gets very serious. “Public Storage has spent considerable time and money on this. They are committed to owning orange doors. If they win, it’s going to have a ripple effect through the entire industry, and one after another, operators will fall like dominoes. And just so you know, they’re filing something similar in Canada too. Operators aren’t safe from this just because they’re not in the United States.”
Joe continues, “But they’re the ones in the wrong. We’re not asking them to change the way they do business, we’re saying they can’t ask us to change how we do business, how our dealers do business, how other operators do business.”
“Royal and I are proud of our dad for doing this,” Stuart says. “Not just standing up for our team and organization but all these other family businesses. Dad taught me when I was a little kid that you need to stand up to bullies or they’ll continue to bully others, and the next person may not be able to fight back. So that’s what he’s doing, standing up for those that can’t stand up for themselves.”
Joe nods, and asks that others join them. “We don’t want anything from [other operators], and we certainly don’t need help with attorney’s fees. We just want to hear from you.”
He encourages anyone concerned about the case, and their own use of the color orange, to reach out to him directly on his cell phone at (602) 390-6525, or via email at Joe@Uhaul.com. “Let’s show the court that this will impact more than just U-Haul,” concludes Joe. “Strength in numbers.”
MSM previously reached out to Public Storage for comment but did not receive a response.
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Brad Hadfield is the MSM website manager and a news writer.