New from me: A look into what may be slowing proptech innovation.
This blog post (and it’s audio version) are almost a decade in the making. In it I share how there’s a huge “reverse salient” that could stop tech innovation in it’s tracks, and how we can work around it.
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✊ Coworking impact.
🗣️ Community implements ‘speak-up system’
Roland Stanley shares how Dragon Coworking have implemented a speak-up system to help members report issues or things that make them feel uncomfortable.
“None of us wants a situation such as racism or discrimination in our workspace, but if we have effective speak-up systems, we can do something about it and truly make everyone feel welcome.”
👉 Read this.
Coworking news & views.
🚳 What if we removed the bikes?
Inc. features a look into the next venture from the cofounders of SoulCycle. Peoplehood is based around hubs for what they call ‘relational fitness’, which is not strictly group therapy but “rather a practice that includes 60-minute sessions called gathers… in which participants practice vital-to-relationships skill called active listening”.
Now… I’m not sure if Julie Rice or Elizabeth Cutler will read this… but you know where you can find amazing spaces to host these gathers? Local coworking spaces. Just saying.
(Edit: Yes I know Julie did join WeWork as the chief brand officer for a wee bit, but still.)
👉 Read this.
✉️ Community team at local space all became notaries
Anne Olsen shares that as part of their team’s mission to be 1% better everyday, they all took the time to become notaries to make more often-inconvenient tasks for their members as easy as popping over to the front desk. Such a cool way of 1-upping your community managers’ value-add.
👉 Read this.
🚀 Why coworking is a hybrid work trend for 2023
Denise Brouder digs a little deeper into why SWAYworkplace predict that coworking is an area that represents the greatest potential for companies to build healthy, long term flexible work strategies.
👉 Read this.
➕ Event excitements boosts drop in revenue
Dana Berggren shares how The Coop is providing workspace and meeting rooms to smaller businesses attending CES 2023 in Las Vegas. Are you exploring what exposure, and revenue, you can drive through local events or conventions?
👉 Read this.
🖐️ A flex space CEO’s 5 predictions for the future of work
Convene’s Ryan Simonetti shares 5 predictions for the future of work, including WFH becoming WNH, workspaces becoming meeting spaces, increased demand for flex, halving of required space (with double the experience) and ‘finally’ some consolidation.
👉 Read this.
🧮 Some ideas on better flex valuation calculations
Sam Gamble shares some ideas about why they believe we should be leaning towards Risk Adjusted Methods for calculating office building valuations when they have a flex component.
👉 Read this.
💝 The one thing you can’t buy for your space
Cat Johnson hit’s it home with another reminder of how community-focussed spaces can beat out larger competitors time and time again. “Someone can always out-spend you, out-fabulous you, out-flex you. But no one can replicate your community.
I love that you can’t buy community—you have to build it.”
👉 Read this.
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💻 Coworking technology.
📜 A post about AI + Real Estate, from 5 years ago.
Antony Slumbers shares a post he made in 2018 around AI and real estate, which included dozens of use cases. Interestingly, with recent developments almost all of them may now be doable.
👉 Read this.
Coworking data.
🇺🇸 Listing platform shares list of largest US operators
CoworkingCafe (which you may remember we introduced as Yardi’s new booking platform in w29/22) shares who the largest US operators are according to their data/listings based on number of locations.
The top 15 are: Regus (832), WeWork (246), Industrious (135), Spaces (117), Premier Workspaces (87), Office Evolution (81), Workstyle Flexible Workplaces (60), Intelligent Office (45), Expansive (43), Venture X (42), LocalWorks (31), COhatch (30), Carr Workplaces (27) and Serendipity Labs (27). They also share that they’d say there’s 5,723 locations nationally.
I’m not sure about these results given I’ve not seen the data, but the national number seems very low, and Regus + Spaces are the same operator, but different brands, but interesting nevertheless.
👉 Read this.
Coworking market moves.
🤠 Common Desk opens 6th Houston location
The new 25,000sqft workspace includes 5 conference rooms, 62 private offices, 5 office suites and a bunch of coworking space. It’s based in Sprint’s City Place mixed-use hub.
👉 Read this.
☀️ Pacific Workplaces to open new SF location
Pacific Workplaces is set to open San Francisco Pacific Heights, its new 10,798-square-foot coworking space in San Francisco. The flex office location is part of a 27,281-square-foot building and marks the company’s second coworking space in the city. Official opening is set for January 26th.
👉 Read this.
⛵️ Partners in Lake Tahoe community list ownership for sale
David Orr shares that their partners have listed their ownership in both the Cowork Tahoe property and operating business.
👉 Read this.
🏠 Big merger in coworking-adjacent coliving sector
Brad Hargreaves shared that Common and Habyt are merging to offer a combined 30,000 units in 40 cities across 14 countries. As we’ve seen in flex (both from operators and their tech), consolidation and M&A activity are on the rise, expect more of this deep into 2023.
👉 Read this.
🇬🇧 Changes at local operator includes no more coworking offering
Matthew Kendall shares that Newtons Co Wo, which started in Bury in 2018 is undergoing some changes for 2023, including dropping publicly accessible coworking space. Interesting move and something I’m watching for a possible trend in changing strategy/offerings from indie operators.
👉 Read this.
☀️ Brand opens new Miami location
Daphne Rasnick shared that Mindspace are launching a new location (their second) in Miami, Florida. The space will include 450 workstations, and 31k sqft of flex office space.
👉 Read this.
🏆 Competition winners overhaul 4.4k sqft hub
Startup Colorado shares that after winning $4k in the Yampa Valley Business Plan Competition the founders of Steamboat Social Club are overhauling a 4.4k sqft coworking & event space in Steamboat Springs.
👉 Read this.
🎙 Coworking conversations.
Dorothy and Dan Bullis chat with Jamie Russo about building a multi-site coworking portfolio (whilst running another significant business) on the Everything Coworking podcast.
📆 Coworking events.
🎤 Discuss this week’s newsletter with us
13 Jan – Join a bunch of us to discuss this newsletter, and the trends the stories may represent.
👉 Read this.
💬 Convo: Community Building Strategies for Space Operators
27 Jan – Community is the biggest factor that sets great coworking spaces apart from the rest. How can you actively build community in your space? Let’s chat about it.
👉 Read this.