Wow, 5000 sq ft! For the HK market, we are starting with a test 1000 sq ft, but are organizing it more as a community, with a plan to open many smaller locations within the country. At most it takes around 1-1.5 hours to go from one part of HK to another, so a network within the country of connected spaces would be quite convenient. The reason for us choosing the size is just economics. 1000 sq ft. is around USD $2,500/month, which could be supported by as few as 10-15 people, depending on their usage. Also, there are many shared offices here, just a desk in an office, so we must be cost-constrained by the market price of those. Which means that for a dedicated desk, we will be looking at (approx) $300/month. Monthly hot desk access would be $225. Limited access and/or hosting a community meetup would be $125. After that is is more focused towards a community pay-what-you-want model, as this top tier should cover the basics, and the growth will depend on how much demand and participation there is from everyone.
On the community side of things, one of the key drivers is to provide a common shared space that diverse groups of mostly technology related meetings (Ruby, Startups, Agile, etc.) can meet up in a consistent location and hopefully a better environment than the offices, coffee shops, and bars they currently meet in. In addition to purely co-work spaces, we will look at having a studio and machine shop as well as potentially more social space. Jon Buford @jonbuford On Fri, Jul 2, 2010 at 6:28 AM, Arne Hulstein <[email protected]>wrote: > Hi Mike, > > We are currently in the process of getting approval for the contracts, so > we are close, but we have been a couple of times over the last two months. > Pretty sure we can do it this time though. > > Our monthly rates for membership have been divided up in a very > straightforward manner: > Basic € 25 for a day per month > Flex € 165 up to three days a week > Pro €225 unlimited use on workdays > > We are actually planning on running it pretty loosely. It will have to > regulate itself for quite a bit. After all, we are all professionals. I have > been thinking about approaching a guy I know who makes card operated locks > for recreational parks etc. so we can log entry and exit, but no steps have > been taken in that direction yet. For now we will probably try to arrange > that one of the founding members will be there every day. After a while that > may drop as the system gets more and more self regulating. > > There are regional bonds here as well. Our main benefit is that in the > Netherlands distances between cities are small. This means we have over a > thousand businesses that have up to 3 people in them within a 10 mile > radius. Enough opportunity to show people what a great way of working this > is. > > My main concern at the moment is the investment in the facilities. After > all, this is a pilot, but I still want it to look nice, which means changing > the floor, doing some painting etc. We'll try to get some sponsors in, but > nothing is finalized just yet. The good part is that we have 5,000 sq ft to > work with. The downside is that we have 5,000 sq ft to work with. But I > think it will be a great pilot and I really do feel that this will be very > beneficial to our society. > > Arne > > > On Thu, Jul 1, 2010 at 1:45 PM, Mike Weiss <[email protected]> wrote: > >> That is almost exactly how large my pilot city is. >> >> I'd be interested to know how your lease works out, what your rates >> will be, what types of plans you will have, and what your >> administration plans are (someone always on site, someone pops in to >> unlock and lock, etc.) >> >> In my area, we have a strong regional bond between two cities, so my >> thoughts are to expand to the other two cities in order to allow >> members of one to work at the other two with no strings attached. >> >> I just want to make sure it works :-) >> >> On Jul 1, 3:05 am, Arne Hulstein <[email protected]> wrote: >> > I am currently in the process of opening a space in a city with 36.000 >> > inhabitants and some extra 15.000 around it. In all honesty, what I have >> > done is that I have found us a large building and I have been convincing >> the >> > owner that I want to run a pilot there. As a result we are currently >> working >> > with a very attractive lease and that means that I can break even with a >> > very low number of members. It also gives us enough room to grow and to >> show >> > people what the concept is all about. If, over time, the concept doesn't >> > catch on, that will have been too bad, but little will be lost. If it >> does, >> > we can move to a more permanent location. >> > >> > Just my thoughts. >> > >> > Arne >> > >> > >> > >> > On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 9:38 PM, Horst <[email protected]> >> wrote: >> > > Hi there, greetings from Germany. >> > >> > > So, how could you find out if a region/city is "worthwhile" to have >> > > it's own coworking space ?! >> > > If it is not the population, how can I find out how people work there >> > > or if there are enough people, who would like to be a part of a >> > > coworking community ?! >> > > And we are not talking about a city like NY, Berlin or London :D (it >> > > is clear to me, that THERE might be enough open minded people who love >> > > to get involved in such a community). >> > >> > > I would like to open a space in a city with about 120.000 people + >> > > ~500.000 more around this city. >> > > The next space is about 40km away from here, than it's another 50km to >> > > the next (coworking seems to become a trend in Germany just about >> > > now). >> > > I think a small space, maybe 20-30 desks would be an idea. >> > > Next step will be my personal business plan :) but I would like to get >> > > some feedback and/or further information from you guys. >> > >> > > Thanks alot ! >> > >> > > -- >> > > 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]<coworking%[email protected]> >> <coworking%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups .com> >> > > . >> > > For more options, visit this group at >> > >http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en. >> >> -- >> 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]<coworking%[email protected]> >> . >> For more options, visit this group at >> http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en. >> >> > -- > 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]<coworking%[email protected]> > . > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. 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