Carson City Company Keeps Data Safe Offsite

By Marian Bond • business@rgj.com • October 21, 2008 

With backgrounds in computer technology and document imaging and scanning, Gerd Poppinga and Brian Olson opened their Carson City business, Offsite Data Depot, in March 2006. The company offers a full range of information management services to local businesses, associations and government offices.

Poppinga said they started the company because of a lack of secure records management around Carson Valley, and they wanted to be there to offer a service that would save money, reduce risk and deal with compliance on regulations. Customers include insurance companies, manufacturers, banks, doctors and attorneys. 

Handout/Reno Gazette-Journal-  Gerd Poppinga says Offsite Data Depot is seeing more interest in its services as the economy sours. Among the services that Offsite Data Depot offers are secure document destruction, storage of records within certain retention periods, digital backup and storage of important data, e-mail filtering, scanning documents and creating virtual filing cabinets.

For document destruction, the company will pick up secured and locked shred bins or consoles from the client or help clean out obsolete paper from filing cabinets and use secure shredders at its facility. The shredded paper is sent to the Bay Area, where it is baled and used as recycled paper.

"This helps the environment," Poppinga said. "It's much better than throwing shredded paper in the garbage. Companies also receive a certificate of destruction."

As for storage of records, every box brought to the company is bar coded and entered into the computer data base.

"Bar-coding technology is brilliant in today's world," Poppinga said. "When we take the customer's information and apply it to the bar code number, we can put it in our warehouse and find it in minutes."

He said that some clients have permanent records, such as the Nevada Supreme Court and Storey County.

The company has a concrete building that features security video surveillance. Only authorized personnel with proper ID can enter.

Offsite Data Depot contracts with a Washington state company to provide off-site data storage for customers online. Information goes directly from a client's computer to a secure server. Poppinga said they wanted to offer this service because it is cost-effective.

"If a client has a question they can call us directly and we will take care of any issues," he said. "Benefits include 24/7 access from anywhere in the world to records for the client, all completely secure. Having off-site backup has several benefits including, and particularly so in case of disaster, fire or theft."

The company also can scan paper documents for a client using high-speed scanners and upload them online, thus creating a repository. This becomes a virtual filing cabinet holding PDF’s.

The company has about 50 clients and is growing. "We're starting to get the momentum because of the economy," Poppinga said. "Business is worried about risk management and their information, and they want to reduce costs. They want security and we manage their information."