Will technology mean the end of traditional document storage?

It may sound like a silly question, but will technology see the end of traditional document storage and archive storage facilities in the UK?
Data Storage in data centres is now becoming very cheap, and it is probably more cost effective to scan document copies and store them electronically. So what does this mean for document storage companies?

In the short to medium term I don't believe that document storage companies will be affected by this use of technology. People are comfortable with the fact that their original documents, that they can touch and feel, are securely stored in an off-site location. Although off-site data backup would be secure and "backed up" there is something about knowing that you have something physical, rather than virtual.

What is important to note however is that this technology is starting to creep its way into document storage facilities in terms of document retrieval. Some document storage service providers allow their clients to access scanned documents over a secure web site which means they can reduce costs in trips to the warehouse when they need to retrieve documents. This is more of an added service for convenience reasons more than anything else.

Some document storage companies might also consider the use of virtual storage as part of their backup procedures although this isn't very common right now due to the workload involved in creating the virtual documents by scanning them into the system.

So to sum it up I don't think that traditional document storage facilities are under any threat from replacement technology just yet and we will be seeing the document storage box in full swing for the foreseeable future!