Hi Marius,
I think your analysis misses a great deal. It's part of what bothered me so
much about the original article: I expect the average person thinking about
this business casually to dramatically underestimate the costs and
overestimate the revenue. You probably haven't been through the
Hi Marius,
I hear your sarcasm so hesitate to reply, but you seem to be sincerely
missing the key point: After operating costs, a space like that could
easily be running at a net loss without paying the owner a penny. The idea
that the average owner of a space with that capacity is taking 25%
Since Will beat me to the send button, I needn't point out the math. I'll
share my personal experience: I left a $100k+ job to open Cowork Frederick.
I have yet to draw a salary and am doing part-time consulting while growing
our cowork community, which slows down the growth of both efforts.
Thanks for more first hand information.
/*
Personally I found this part particularly interesting.
Even if you're talking about a space that has 100 full-time members at
$200 per member in a big city, you are very likely not looking at a
coworking space where the owners are making what they
praise
Oren- +10. Thanks for clearly articulating the hard work (and joy) of
being an owner/operator. As one myself, I have yet to meet anyone who has
started a space to make crazy money who was still with it for very long.
I also think it is fine for us to reinforce that coworking is not for
In my analysis of the article I tried to be objective, impartial. (I don't get
which great deal I've missed, but no worries there.)”
The “great deal[s]” you’ve missed are:
overestimated # of memberships
overestimated take-home pay of $5k, or 25%
wrong math of
Oops, sorry about the bad math (the vision of the 2 and the 5 there
took over the 12 not there)
I kind of stand by my non-numerical opinions, but no big issue, just
philosophy in very early state, it's a long way to the truth, and you guys
are incredibly helpful, thanks.
As said opinions are
Right on, Aaron!
On Sun, Feb 8, 2015 at 12:06 AM, Aaron Cruikshank aa...@cruikshank.me
wrote:
I want to respond to this directly because I have been involved in running
and setting up both non-profit and for-profit coworking spaces. The social
economy does not equal giving things away for
I find it sad that this discussion of whether or not coworking is worth it
is now based on shallow quantitative analysis of coworking's profitability.
Marius is more off-base with his accusations than his numbers. As far as I
understand it, his grievances with coworking are: 1. Coworking is
Nice to ear first hand from owners with social awareness and practices,
thanks.
Sorry if my observation sounded general i.e. about all spaces.
Of course you cannot charge below cost (never said that).
(But, as you say yourself, very few people are getting rich in this
business. So, still, some
Marius, I do see your empathy for the unemployed. It's commendable. But your
below is unfortunately contradictory. You say one cannot charge below cost, but
later criticize the typical plan is too $$. What if a space offers at cost,
maybe 10% less? 20% less? Would that really help the
Hmm, you're right my statement was kind of confusing--because I have used
low ballpark figures (200$ city, 100$ village). Such values are on the fair
side. Social enough in spirit (meaning you're not rolling in bank notes).
Nevertheless I feel it can be lowered still. 100 members at 200$ equals
100 members are a lot for most spaces.
Jerome
www.BLANKSPACES.com
On Feb 8, 2015, at 10:57 AM, Marius Amado-Alves amado.al...@gmail.com wrote:
Hmm, you're right my statement was kind of confusing--because I have used low
ballpark figures (200$ city, 100$ village). Such values are on the
Not read the article, but I do feel cowork fees are too high in a couple
contexts:
space with hundreds of coworkers in a big city e.g. Berlin thus earning
many tens of thousands of euros monthly; that's very good business for the
owner, but somehow inbalanced w.r.t. to the social economy
I want to respond to this directly because I have been involved in running
and setting up both non-profit and for-profit coworking spaces. The social
economy does not equal giving things away for below cost. A social
enterprise still needs to operate as a business entity - just one that puts
Nick Clark of Common Desk in Dallas wrote a pretty good response exposing
the poor math in this
article:
http://thecommondesk.com/blog/coworking-spaces-the-inexpensive-solution-for-a-cool-office
On Wednesday, February 4, 2015 at 3:31:48 AM UTC-6, Will Bennis, Locus
Workspace wrote:
I have
If the writer knew what he was talking about, he wouldn't have hyphenated
the word coworking. Duh!
On Wednesday, February 4, 2015 at 2:31:48 AM UTC-7, Will Bennis, Locus
Workspace wrote:
I have never been so pissed by an article on coworking:
If the writer knew what he was talking about, he wouldn’t have hyphenated the
word “coworking”. Duh!
I wish that were true. Editors, again, religiously follow the AP Stylebook and
since coworking as a term is neither in the dictionary nor in the Stylebook,
even the BEST writers who bring
The reality of business press coverage is sometimes you lose - and this was
one of those times. It was clear while I was being interviewed the reporter
had a negative point of view about coworking and considered it very
expensive. I tried to move him off of this and suggested to talk to others
Yep, to add to what Steve said: I can usually tell when a reporter has had
their story assigned to them from an editor during the interview and I can
ALWAYS tell from the final product.
This is one of those stories.
I’d bet $100 that the editor was like, “oh, all of these happy
Well, the intangibles cited by Liz in the article certainly cured my
loneliness. And I didn't even have to pay exorbitant NeueHouse rates (good
thing, because what passes for coworking there costs more than rent on my
Manhattan apartment). Just sayin'.
If anything, this article spurred my
People who have never run a business often think that sort of thing. It is
a really silly article, I agree with that. His other articles are no less
silly though.
But Steve King (quoted in the article) is usually around here somewhere,
maybe he will have something to add.
On Wednesday,
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