Storage Hunters

Sean Kelly grew up in Germany. After leaving school, he worked as a store detective before joining the Army, becoming a German interpreter, and then being stationed in Iraq. He then worked as an auctioneer, and compering comedy clubs at night. After a fight broke out at an auction, he came up with the idea for the show, describing it as "Antiques Roadshow meets WWF!"^[3]

The show was originally developed by S. Tobin Kirk, Kevin Lewis, Timothy Brown, and Juan Granja under their banner Hard Boiled Entertainment, which they founded while working together at a design and motion graphics company called Famer Brown in Venice, California. After shaping the concept and attending several storage auctions for research, Tobin connected with Sean Kelly, and together they entered into a production deal with The T-Group, who subsequently sold the series to TruTV.

For the US series, bidders Brandon and Lori Bernier. It continued with the Taylor Brothers, Jesse McClure, Tarrell "T-Money" Wright, Ron "Papa Bear" Kirkpatrick, Kashuna, Wade, FJ, Gary "Goal Machine" Madine, Scott and Chrissy Tassone, the Alvardo Brothers, "Desert Dan," Mone Smith, Will and Nick Eastwood, Soccer Mom and the lock cutters/security guards, Will C. (Season 1), Cameron "Green Mile" Rowe (Season 2-Season 3).^[4][5] The series was cancelled on TruTV after Season 3 ended.^[6]

In the UK and Ireland the show has been broadcast and repeated on the digital channel Dave. In 2014, Dave commissioned a spin-off series called Storage Hunters UK, featuring Kelly reprising his role as auctioneer with a series of UK bidders hunting for valuables across the UK.^[7] Dave renewed the UK version for two more series in 2015,^[8] with the second series beginning on 2 June and featuring US regulars Jesse and T-Money.^[9] Series 3 of the show premiered on 15 September 2015.^[10]

A fifth series was commissioned to air from April 2016, with Kelly returning alongside regular bidders from series 4.

A one-off UK celebrity special aired at Christmas 2015, with any money made being donated to the celebrity individual charities. This was followed by a series of 5 more celebrity episodes that aired at the end of 2016.^[11]

The show has been well received in Britain, with the first episode of Storage Hunters UK being watched by over 1.1 million viewers, beating ratings for several prime time television shows broadcast that week.^[12]

The Guardian's Rhik Samadder described Kelly's auctioneering style "like someone has attached electrodes to a woodpecker".^[13] Tom Eames writing in Digital Spy described it as "one of the least authentic and most fake shows you will ever see, and comes under the umbrella of 'trashy reality' programmes that the US are very good at", but adding that "somehow, it is strangely addictive and enjoyable, and has clearly become a big guilty pleasure of many UK viewers."^[14]

Presenter Sean Kelly has attributed the success of the show to the participants' lack of social skills and compared it to "watching a carnival".^[13] In an interview for Digital Spy he speculated that the strong popularity of the show in the UK may lead to a revival of the US series.^[15]

• Auction Hunters, a similar show on Spike TV
• Storage Wars, a similar show on A&E TV
• Container Wars, a similar series on TruTV