🎉 Coworking celebrations.
📚 Coworking leader becomes a WELL AP.
Huge congrats to Amy King from Good Coworking (and TWIC community member) on smashing the certification exams and becoming an Accredited Professional, which denotes their expertise in the WELL Building Standard.
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📰 Coworking updates.
🇺🇸 The US government leans into coworking.
Last week the GSA (who handle procurement for US government agencies) announced that they’ve awarded a $50M contract to 5 companies to help some of the 2.1M federal employees access coworking spaces.
The five companies are: Expansive, WeWork, The Yard, Deskpass and LiquidSpace.
In this blog post I summarize what I could find out, some answers to the questions you posed when the news broke, and what it could all mean for coworking – both in the US and across the globe.
🤚 5 of the personalities you’ll meet in a coworking space.
Iman Bashir had me at her first line “Let’s be honest: Working from home sucks”.
In this humorous article in Entrepreneur, readers are introduced to 5 personalities they may run into at their local coworking space.
I’ve definitely come across some of these in communities across different countries… heck I’ve probably been two of them at some point. (Thanks Amy King for sharing this link.)
🧳 Are VC backed startups swapping offices for team trips?
Matthew Parsons shares an interesting look into data from Kruze Consulting who have been tracking the spending patterns of 400 startups since 2019.
Notably, the % of startups paying for rent dropped from 85 to 60. Interestingly though, a lot of that redirected spend is going to Airbnb as startups rent houses and arrange in-person off-sites instead of joining coworking spaces.
A comparison of a random Thursday: Home vs Coworking.
Richard Groß shares a comparison between a random Thursday in his life when he worked from a home office compared to after he joined a coworking space (and before he became a community manager at betahaus).
🌤 Outdoor work and meeting spaces launched in downtown DC.
The DowntownDC BID has partnered up with WorkChew and Verizon to introduce outdoor workspaces called DC Wokeries which are open Monday – Friday from 11am to 5pm.
The BID is also offering 350 free memberships on a first-come, first-served basis.
📈 Could automated check-ins boost coworking revenues?
Automated check-in can be a game-changer as you work to get your space back in the black. Satellite Deskworks share 4 ways to increase your revenue with automated check-in.
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💻 Coworking technology.
🤖 Workspace tech automation platform announces pricing.
Although still in private beta, Syncaroo have introduced their freemium pricing model.
This piece dives into the decision-making behind the model, and why it is important to make the pricing for flex space automation accessible, sustainable and simple.
📲 On-demand booking app reaches emotional milestone.
Mathieu Schepard shares PopDesk‘s latest milestones (80 locations in 13 states) but also 6 reasons these milestones mean so much to him and his.
Always great to see the real emotions that exist behind the different tech platforms that enable more people to connect with flex workspaces.
🇨🇦 Canadian workspace booking app launches in Ottawa.
Justin Raymond shares that Flexday is now live in his hometown of Ottawa, featuring flagship partners Staples Studio, iQ Offices and TCC Canada.
🖖 New ‘flex-in-a-box’ software option announced.
Ben Silver shares how 3DEN are making the tech they use to power and automate their flex workspaces available to retail, multi-family and commercial landlords who’d like to turn some of their space into flex space.
Coworking data & trends.
🇦🇺 Flex space transactions up over 100% in suburban Australia.
According to Flexible Workspace Australia and The Instant Group‘s 2021 market report, suburban flex workspaces saw an average rise in transactions of 100+ percent from 2019 to 2020.
💸 A VC polled their portfolio about office utilization.
Fred Wilson, a NYC based investor, polled the portfolio of companies they’ve invested in about their office space usage.
One of the questions was about employee-to-desk ratios, and of the 56 responding companies 11 (or 19.6%) would have 1 desk for every employee and just over 10% (6 companies) would leverage coworking passes for their employees, whilst 8 (or ~14%) wouldn’t offer any physical workspace to their team.
📉 Has Delta dented that flex space SPAC?
Chris Bryant dives into the numbers in this Bloomberg Opinion piece on whether WeWork‘s SPAC (via BowX Acquisition Corp) has lost momentum due to worries around the Delta variant.
Coworking market moves.
🔥 3 red-hot emerging sectors in office technology.
Ashkán Zandieh looks at 3 sectors of office technology that are heating up based on market trends and venture activity.
Whilst the article is insightful the 3 areas of rapid growth are “Flexibility and the Future of the Office” (including coworking), “Tech-Enabled Commercial Real Estate” and “Software and the Future of the Office”.
Another interesting side note is that since 2010, $5.7 billion has been invested in office technology companies.
💰 Workspace operator brings in new COO as they eye IPO.
Industrious have appointed Liz Simon (prev. General Assembly) as their new COO as prepare for an Initial Public Offering.
🤸♀️ The remarkable journey behind this mega PropTech merger.
Phil Kirschner shares the almost dizzying path iOffice and SpaceIQ have been on before their merger.
They’ve gone through acquisitions, rebrands, re-acquisitions, so it’s def been a journey culminating in a whole new merger this week.
✌️ Multi-national operator changes up membership offerings.
Olly Olsen shares just how fishing proud he is of The Office Group‘s new coworking memberships.
The UK flex space operator (with locations in Germany too) has switched up their offerings adding Roam or Home tiers.
🎙 Coworking conversations.
Caleb Parker chats with Michael Cockburn from Desana about the changing nature of knowledge work, and the office’s place in the platform of work.
Bernie Mitchell and Sarah Colwell chat about her recent conference talk titled “A Dysfunctional Year Researched by The Instant Group”.
Jamie Russo caught up with Mark Gilbreath about the GSA contract and how it works.
📆 Coworking events.
🗺 Free GMB event for coworking spaces.
At this free event, hosted by the London Coworking Assembly, digital marketing strategist Sonya Whittam will share her top tips for perfecting your coworking space’s Google My Business profile, at a time when it’s more important to do so than ever.
💼 Coworking jobs.
Find or post coworking jobs for free here.