Mike, I'm happy to see you run the numbers and share with the group. Hopefully more people will chime in on this thread with their numbers. There seems to be a spectrum of views on coworking as a business vs. a social movement. I think it's OK to run through the business side of things. If coworking is dependent on someone's sacrifice, it's not very viable in the long term. Even without a cash flow sacrifice, the are plenty of other areas to give like time, labor, passion, etc.
I think it would be great in the longer term if these sort of data and wisdom get collected into a coworking business manual of sorts. On another note, your numbers making up your community seem small. I wonder what the minimum number of members are needed for critical mass? At the low end, it's just a few friends sharing an office, and at the high end people start to slip into anonymity. I'd be interested in hearing what others think about this or should this be another thread? Chris On Feb 3, 12:23 pm, turbo2ltr <[email protected]> wrote: > Haha, thanks for the reply Paul. > > I do have an anchor tenant.. me. The first phase of the plan will be > to utilize my existing space that I use for an unrelated company. I > realized I am under utilizing the current space and there was room to > take half of it (after a lot of "do I really need this" cleaning..) > and dedicate it to coworking. So I am not necessarily concerned with > cashflow right now. My company is taking care of the bills and I want > to use this "free" space to build the community and see if there is > really a market for a larger space.... so I do want to see that it's, > at least in theory, capable of flowing cash in the long run. While I > want the community to be first and foremost when it comes to the > space, I'm not independently wealthy that I can support a space that > has negative cashflow. > > -Mike > > On Feb 3, 1:08 pm, "[email protected]" <[email protected]> wrote: > > > Holy Crap ---- Thats a lot of numbers..... > > > From my perspective if you're worried about cashflow....build the > > network and get the commitments ahead of time. > > As many of us here can attest opening the doors does not equate to the > > space being utilized. > > We have been open since November and have 3 full time members, 3 part > > time, 3-4 who only use the conference room once or twice a month. > > We have 5-6 people who have dropped by more than once but don't want a > > committment. > > > Now all that said, from our perspective we're okay because our > > overhead is mostly absorbed by my "day job". But if you don't have > > the luxury > > of having a built in "anchor" tennant I would imagine you'd be > > stressing to put together an accurate useage model without the network > > being their first... > > > Just my humble opinion. > > > Paulwww.businessplayce.com > > 703-623-5804 --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ 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 -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
