🎉 Coworking celebrations.
✊ Women Who Cowork turns 5!
On Monday, Women Who Cowork also celebrated 5 years of connecting and supporting womxn-led coworking spaces around the world.
🤩 Coworking Day was inspiring!
Monday was International Coworking Day, and it was inspiring to watch all the invitations, activities and gratitude being shared online.
Spaces hosted open days, gave away day passes, made & shared tasty treats and so much more.
There was also a lot of great content shared, from Cat Johnson‘s open letter, to Tobias Kremkaus‘ history lesson, to the first national ‘coworking in the library day‘ in Italy, to a whole bunch of Ontario-based coworking spaces sharing why they cooperate through collectives… there was just so much great stuff being shared.
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📰 Coworking updates.
🚀 Coworking market expected to surpass $13B by 2025.
In Ben Swanger‘s post on why coworking is booming, he drops some interesting statistics, namely that by the end of 2021 the worldwide coworking market is expected to grow to $8.14B, up from $7.97B in 2020. It’s also mentioned that it’s expected to reach $13.03B by 2025.
Whilst the post mostly covers the larger brands in Dallas, this growth is definitely mirrored by both – indie operators and smaller regional chains.
📹 Two coworking brands introduce new ‘coworking 101’ video.
The teams (and members) at CapeSpace and Groundwork put together a new video addressing what exactly coworking is, comparing their spaces to “hotels for workers”.
They also introduced a new exchange program, giving members 2 day passes a month for using each others spaces.
💡 Introducing the ‘Ops Stack’ framework for flex workspaces.
There’s so many ways to market, fill and operate flex workspaces!
Syncaroo have shared their framework to help workspace operators make sense of the ever-growing list of options available to them.
From technology, to services, to internal staff, this framework can help decision-makers avoid analysis paralysis and leaving a tonne of cash on the table as flex demand & new opportunities skyrocket.
👩🍳 DoorDash launches pop up kitchen in San Jose.
DoorDash has announced a popup kitchen in San Jose, bringing some of SF’s favs and some national names, to the area.
Think of it as a popup coworking space, for restaurants, to bring deliveries to new areas, so whilst not strictly coworking related, it is definitely coworking-adjacent.
I do believe this popup was supported by Ben Seidl‘s Neyborly, so def expect to see more from them in this space.
🚪 A dive into automated door access for coworking.
Barbara Sprenger and Ken Meshke from Satellite Deskworks dive into many of the access control options available to coworking spaces, whilst also looking into why an automated access system is huge benefit for spaces of all sizes.
🤔 Are you living the coworking values?
In celebration of International Coworking Day you’re invited to reflect upon the coworking core values – community, collaboration, openness, accessibility, and sustainability.
Are you living the coworking values? Do your actions match your intention? How can we ensure the coworking industry is inclusive, diverse, and equitable?
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💻 Coworking technology.
😷 Third space platform adds health validation.
KettleOS and CLEARED4 have partnered up to make their network of third places (in NYC for now) safer to access through the seamless sharing of health information in a HIPAA-compliant manner.
📲 Working club app adds instant bookings and more.
Nick Donnelly from WorkClub introduced 3 updates to their iOS and Android apps, namely Instant Booking confirmations, Automatic Refunds, and Free Trial Days.
🙋♀️ Coworking community platform adds support for member issues.
The andcards team introduced their new seamless support module, allowing spaces using their software to quickly report and address issues from within the platform.
Coworking data.
💥 Demand for flex exploded in Q2.
Kelsey Neubauer shares a number of interesting Q2 data-points from across the flex workspace industry.
Alongside Upsuite‘s data, which we covered in last week’s newsletter, we saw that there was a 156% increase in flex office deals signed in NYC (according to Workthere), that Industrious saw a 156% increase in seats sold in the city, and that Primary is on track to hit 50% occupancy by September.
Interestingly, Gene Kansas of Constellations in Atlanta, also mentioned that before Feb they’d only worked with a broker on a single deal, but now they accounted for 30% of the deals signed.
📊 How do teams use flex space?
Deskpass shared the results of their recent survey of teams using their workspace booking platform.
67% of those who responded want to work from coworking spaces 1-2 times a week, whilst a slither above 25% would want to frequent coworking spaces more regularly at 2-3 times a week. Over 64% worked from coworking spaces for 4-6 hours per day on average, with 29% working for over 8 hours.
Also, all employees said they repeatedly visit 1 to 3 spaces, and amenities influence which spaces they use (with phone booths and designated quiet areas being the most important).
🤝 Coworking deals.
🔥 Did you hear about Cushman + WeWork?
Incase you missed it, real estate media has gone ba-na-nas around how Cushman & Wakefield and WeWork are discussing a $150M partnership.
From what I can gather, this deal is designed to help the former offer more options to both their owner and occupier clients, whilst helping the latter expand into more locations on favorable terms. If it goes through, the $150M would be invested into Bow, which is the SPAC taking WeWork public.
🖌 1776 becomes 76 Forward.
Jennifer Maher and Charlotte Lee share the how, and the why, this network of business-enabling hubs became 76 Forward after 18 months of discovery, reflection and planning.
🌏 JV leads to 32 APAC locations changing hands.
Aayat Ali shares how IWG and Hysan Development announced a joint ventur that would entail the former taking over and running 32 locations under the Regus, Spaces and Signature brands.
Half of these locations are in Hong Kong, a region that’s seen a surge in market moves recently.
🛍 Coworking… at Saks Fifth?
WeWork was once again in the news this week, with a deal to bring coworking into Saks Fifth Avenue locations, through the brand called SaksWork. Membership will cost $299 p/month, and locations will offer a cafe, gym and open plan workspace.
Cheryl Roth also highlighted on LinkedIn that Amy Sterner Nelson, founder of The Riveter, will be leading this.
🤖 AI/ML proptech company strategically acquired.
JLL announced that they’ve acquired Skyline AI, a property tech startup that processes and makes sense of 10,000 attributes across 300 data sources to help identify commercial real estate investment opportunities.
The NYSE listed firm initially was an investor in the startup since 2018 through JLL Spark where Yishai Lerner (co-CEO at JLL Tech) says they “invest in innovative proptech companies and leverage the resources of JLL to accelerate their growth”.
Expect even more proptech + data investments and acquisitions.
🎙 Coworking conversations.
Caleb Parker chats with Melanie Jones and Todd Simpson from CORT all about furniture-as-a-service.
💼 Coworking jobs.
Find or post coworking jobs for free here.
