Alex Hillman <dangerouslyawesome <at> gmail.com> writes: > Brent, > While I think you're asking the right questions, it's in the wrong order. > > Before you are concerned with the financial viability, you should be looking to see if there is any existing community with a need for shared office space, or if there is a need for the community to be built around a shared office.
Hey Alex - I have gotten quite a bit of feedback that there is a need, and I've met plenty of people who said they like the atmosphere and the community that we already have in the building. As a production company, we have about 20 fun, creative individuals as built-in "anchors," about half of which are in the building 40-hours per week. I've read through quite a bit of the archives, and have seen this "community first" discussion several times. I'm not looking to make a ton of money. Never was my point; my core business is supposed to take care of that for me. I'm just looking to keep my spare square footage occupied and generating revenue, and I'm looking to do it in a manner that is compatible with the community I already have in place. Let me provide an analogy from personal experience that makes me nervous about ignoring the financials, and going balls-out 'community first.' My father is a tremendous soccer fan. He plays soccer 3 nights a week, all his friends play soccer, they go to a local pub at 3 in the morning to watch European soccer matches live, they go to local high schools to watch soccer (even when they don't know any of the kids playing), and he is part of a huge soccer community in San Diego. As a matter of fact, if you like soccer, and you live in San Diego, you would almost certainly recognize my father's name. However, when my he took over ownership of a professional soccer franchise, he nearly lost his shirt (or nearly lost his cleats if you prefer to extend the analogy). Why? Because this tremendous, vibrant, close-knit, soccer-loving community didn't want to pay to see the games. They SAID they wanted to pay to see the games, but when it came time to pull the wallet out, their response was often "But we're soccer fans! We're a community! Can't you get us in for free or AT LEAST a discount?" It is all well and good to have a vibrant community, but if you can't pay the rent, that community will have no place to go (or more precisely will go someplace else). It is my experience that in this web 2.0 world, people often don't feel they have to pay for community (I can't think of a single successful online community that currently survives as a pay-for-subscription model). People *SAY* they understand that a business needs to pay the bills, but when it comes down to it, the free option wins out almost every time. So to rephrase my questions: 1) IN GENERAL, are owners of current co-working spaces finding that people are ACTUALLY pulling out their wallets to be a part of co-working communities? From what you're saying, it sounds like they are... 2) I have feedback that there is interest in a co-working space in San Diego (and one of my good friends and business associates at Digital Telepathy have just begun offering space). Is it OK if that space is a part of town that is generally office-park-ish, or do successful co-working spaces find that they need to be in a "COOL" part of town? 3) I have some ideas of the amenities that I want to provide, but I'm looking for feedback from current successful co-working operators as to what their communities find appealing; what makes your community members say "oh wow... this is really nice to have!" and keeps them coming back? 4) Other than not planning for "community first," are there some not-obvious mistakes that successful (or better yet, UNsuccessful!) co-working spaces have made? And can you offer tips for avoiding those mistakes? Thanks! -- Brent Altomare Executive Producer Groovy Like a Movie --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
