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 too expensive for the common man who needs it. 2. Coworking space operators are getting rich by charging excessively. 3. People on this thread have real experiences not based in conjecture and are willing to do actual research (like reading the article in the OP)
- As others have stated, the market determines prices. Find me a more inexpensive option for the independent worker and I’ll believe you coworking is overpriced.
Furthermore, free or discounted coworking HELPS NO ONE IN THE LONG RUN, not even the coworker. If the coworker has to rely on the benevolence or patronage of another individual to make their workplace sustainable, they have lost their workplace independence and interdependence on each other to share the space. They are instead, much like a factory employee or unemployed citizen on the dole, dependent on some third party to provide things for them.
The common man has banded together to create coworking and is working very hard to sustain it. As far as I know, coworking is priced very affordably for an independent professional in every city. You cannot isolate a location like NYC, SF, Tokyo, or London and extrapolate its prices to the rest of the world. If it was too expensive for the local population, it would go out of business (as many coworking spaces do). Just like all other markets, a FAIR PRICE (determined by supply/demand) is reached through equilibrium. The barrier to entry is way too low to enforce any local oligopoly.
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No one on this thread (save for maybe Jerome
) has built an empire or made a fortune in coworking. This is a ridiculous conclusion from the misinformation Marius has accumulated in 1 above. Not even going to address this further. -
You are not the first nor the last person to judge coworking from afar. Just curious Marius, how much time have you spent in a coworking space? Are you a proud member of your coworking community? You don’t have to be an owner/operator to enjoy the benefits of coworking. In my experience, the owner/operator role is actually the least desirable in the community because it carries so much more obligation and duty than any other member.
Free from those obligations, have you found people you can collaborate with? Have you found coworkers that inspire you and challenge you when you need feedback on a project? Have you found coworkers you can’t wait to dedicate your weekend to helping? Have you found coworkers that you can’t wait till happy hour to grab a beer with? Until you’ve experienced the sense of belonging in a coworking community, I don’t think any amount of shitty math can justify 1 Euro a month.
The real story has nothing to do with the above. The poorly understood economics of profitability for a coworking space should have little influence on someone looking to join a space. The things that should matter are:
- Does this space have the necessary features for me to do work here?
- Is the space and community an environment that empowers and motivates me?
- Are these the people I want to spend my waking hours around?
- Are my membership dues a fair exchange for the benefits received above?
The irony of this whole discussion to me is that no one has ever not joined Fort Work as a result of the inability to pay. Granted, we are priced very competitively for our market, but I don’t think that’s why. More common that not, members are actually suspicious of the low cost and have on more than one occasion questioned the financial viability of the space if we did not RAISE RATES. Yes, I have members come up to me and tell me they feel uncomfortable about the low costs and felt they owed more.
Many others have said that placing a price on coworking is actually impossible because the value is not collected upfront. I think they correctly realize that coworking in its very nature is not transactional, but about forming relationships.
Thus from a relationship viewpoint, I think this argument can be redeveloped for any relationship, a classic example being the cost comparison between a whore and a wife, or on doing your own taxes vs hiring an accountant, etc. In the end, one can’t put a price on a relationship, not because it won’t be quantified, but because the numbers betray the story of what a relationship is all about.
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On Monday, February 9, 2015 at 11:18:55 AM UTC-6, Marius Amado-Alves wrote:
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 a bit counter the usual praise of coworking they’re bound to be provocative here, yes, but not sarcastic as such, hope you believe that, I don’t want to be recalled as the sarcastic guy here, please.
Ok I see now some owners have quit their 100k+ jobs to go develop coworking. Good.
Thanks.