We just celebrated our one year anniversary and it was really exciting. This past year has been no less than extremely awesome.
We have met so many great people, we have over 45 members, representing over 20 businesses. Our private offices are almost all full (only 4/24 left) and I feel like we’ve really built a great community.
However, I am feeling burnt out. My husband and I opened and funded this ourselves. We knew from the beginning that it was not going to be one of our most profitable endeavors (we run several other businesses as well), but we ended up making enough to pay the basics and even adding new furniture, etc as we went along. My husband spends most of his time running the other businesses so I’ve done a lot of this myself, which is fine but I’m anxious to lighten the load so I can focus on some of our other businesses as well. The problem is that we still aren’t making enough to pay anyone to help. I don’t even get paid and it’s close to a full time job to run a space like this especially if you want to keep active in the community, be hosting events, collaborating with other organization, etc. Not to mention just the upkeep of over 11,000+ sq ft! I’d like to start asking members to pitch in but I’m wondering how other spaces operate. Do you just hire someone to keep the space clean? Who deals with taking out the trash, wiping down desks, etc? We need to figure something out. I want members to feel some sense of ownership and pride for our space and I think empowering them to pitch in a little here and there would really help. With this many members it really wouldn’t require much from any one person.
This is a running tasks list of things that need to be done regularly that someone could do in 2-5 minutes.
Take out a bag of trash/recycling
Wipe down a counter
Sweep
Spot mop (front entry or lunch room)
Wipe down a few desks in the community space
Straighten the pillow in the mini conference room
Refill sugar/creamer at coffee station
Vacuum a hallway
Dishes (everyone should be doing their own, but sometimes there’s a dirty glass that gets left by the sink)
It’s a way to get people involved that can’t afford to rent space but who would benefit from being there and a way to get help with space maintenance.
They’ve been running it for years at the HiVE and while there is turnover, it’s a good program.
Aaron
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On Wed, Aug 12, 2015 at 12:19 PM, Aloma Loren [email protected] wrote:
Hi guys,
First of all I’m so grateful I can post here!
We just celebrated our one year anniversary and it was really exciting. This past year has been no less than extremely awesome.
We have met so many great people, we have over 45 members, representing over 20 businesses. Our private offices are almost all full (only 4/24 left) and I feel like we’ve really built a great community.
However, I am feeling burnt out. My husband and I opened and funded this ourselves. We knew from the beginning that it was not going to be one of our most profitable endeavors (we run several other businesses as well), but we ended up making enough to pay the basics and even adding new furniture, etc as we went along. My husband spends most of his time running the other businesses so I’ve done a lot of this myself, which is fine but I’m anxious to lighten the load so I can focus on some of our other businesses as well. The problem is that we still aren’t making enough to pay anyone to help. I don’t even get paid and it’s close to a full time job to run a space like this especially if you want to keep active in the community, be hosting events, collaborating with other organization, etc. Not to mention just the upkeep of over 11,000+ sq ft! I’d like to start asking members to pitch in but I’m wondering how other spaces operate. Do you just hire someone to keep the space clean? Who deals with taking out the trash, wiping down desks, etc? We need to figure something out. I want members to feel some sense of ownership and pride for our space and I think empowering them to pitch in a little here and there would really help. With this many members it really wouldn’t require much from any one person.
This is a running tasks list of things that need to be done regularly that someone could do in 2-5 minutes.
Take out a bag of trash/recycling
Wipe down a counter
Sweep
Spot mop (front entry or lunch room)
Wipe down a few desks in the community space
Straighten the pillow in the mini conference room
Refill sugar/creamer at coffee station
Vacuum a hallway
Dishes (everyone should be doing their own, but sometimes there’s a dirty glass that gets left by the sink)
Aloma, congrats on building a great cowork space. I think your problem is that you didn't set out to build a great business. I think you need to sit down and see how to turn this into a viable business. It seems to me that your margins are not aligned with generating profits. If you raised your rates by $30/member you'll have an additional $1350 per month to help reduce your workload or take a small salary. Best of luck! Eric
I agree with Eric. I can add from my own experience running a space with 150 members is that once your members are used to a level of service, and are comfortable with the expectations you have of them day to day, it’s very difficult to change that. We’ve had a situation where everyone knew that this was a not for profit venture, but me and the team here were so passionate about building the best space in the world that we massively overdelivered, and now whenever we’ve tried to push back to the members and ask them to do more, they do understand but they aren’t motivated enough to do it- they are fine with the status quo we’ve created. Entirely our fault, and we’re having to work hard to slowly manage expectations downwards, to have a different approach with new members, and as Eric says, put the prices up. That’s meant we can work towards getting more resource to make the place run smoothly. Cheers, Tom
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On Friday, 14 August 2015 04:30:28 UTC+1, Eric Lituchy wrote:
Aloma, congrats on building a great cowork space. I think your problem is that you didn’t set out to build a great business. I think you need to sit down and see how to turn this into a viable business. It seems to me that your margins are not aligned with generating profits. If you raised your rates by $30/member you’ll have an additional $1350 per month to help reduce your workload or take a small salary. Best of luck! Eric
Thank you for your feedback. We are slowly raising our prices but we are already the most expensive coworking space in town so we have to keep that in mind. We are also considered the higher end space so I think that allows us to attract more established business members and charge more. I have to admit I struggle with this aspect of it, charging for services is not my strong point so I appreciate the input and encouragement.
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On Thursday, August 13, 2015 at 8:30:28 PM UTC-7, Eric Lituchy wrote:
Aloma, congrats on building a great cowork space. I think your problem is that you didn’t set out to build a great business. I think you need to sit down and see how to turn this into a viable business. It seems to me that your margins are not aligned with generating profits. If you raised your rates by $30/member you’ll have an additional $1350 per month to help reduce your workload or take a small salary. Best of luck! Eric
Thank you so much for your input. We definitely set the expectation and so I’ve been trying to be very strategic and gentle in how we move forward. Reminding members that the space is volunteer run and that it is important that people clean up after themselves has helped a lot. I’ve also offered a couple memberships for trade in exchange for help around the space and that is working out great.
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On Friday, August 14, 2015 at 3:13:40 AM UTC-7, Tom Lewis wrote:
I agree with Eric. I can add from my own experience running a space with 150 members is that once your members are used to a level of service, and are comfortable with the expectations you have of them day to day, it’s very difficult to change that. We’ve had a situation where everyone knew that this was a not for profit venture, but me and the team here were so passionate about building the best space in the world that we massively overdelivered, and now whenever we’ve tried to push back to the members and ask them to do more, they do understand but they aren’t motivated enough to do it- they are fine with the status quo we’ve created. Entirely our fault, and we’re having to work hard to slowly manage expectations downwards, to have a different approach with new members, and as Eric says, put the prices up. That’s meant we can work towards getting more resource to make the place run smoothly. Cheers, Tom
On Friday, 14 August 2015 04:30:28 UTC+1, Eric Lituchy wrote:
Aloma, congrats on building a great cowork space. I think your problem is that you didn’t set out to build a great business. I think you need to sit down and see how to turn this into a viable business. It seems to me that your margins are not aligned with generating profits. If you raised your rates by $30/member you’ll have an additional $1350 per month to help reduce your workload or take a small salary. Best of luck! Eric
