What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work?
Like,
- at least 100,000 people in a 5 mile radius
- at least 100,000 small businesses in a 5 mile radius
etc.
Thanks!
Cassidy
How many people are in a radius doesn’t really matter, if none of those people care about or need Coworking.
We did something counterintuitive when we began: we put Indy Hall in a place where NONE of our community members already were. We chose a neighborhood that was easily accessible my public transit (something important to our community), but all of our early members lived in 3 main parts of the city and we chose to open in an area that was relatively central to all 3. If we had picked any one of those three parts, the other 2/3rds of our community would’ve felt more disconnected.
Bur I say relative because that’s important. There is ALWAYS someone who will say that you’re too far away. In our case, that can be as “far away” as 4 subway stops. It depends on what people are used to.
All of this stems from answering a bigger question and asking: who are your members? Not a demographic, or people you hope to reach…but who are the ACTUAL people that you CAN reach. Where are they, and where do they already go? Do they cross neighborhoods? How do they get there? What kind of work do they do? Can they work from anywhere? Do they have the power to choose where they work? Do they like the way they work, or is there a problem or set of problems?
I’m a HUGE supporter of doing pop-up Coworking (aka Jelly, workatjelly.com) for a while before selecting any space because it’s the ideal way of seeing who actually shows up, and where, and most importantly WHY. Is it because they need a place to work? Or…is it because they’re lonely at home and cafes are awkward to be a professional.
And you can find all of that our before ever wasting time on finding the “perfect” location (which doesn’t exist, that’s a fantasy) and without spending a dollar, unsure if you’ll ever see that dollar again.
-Alex
···
The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://listen.coworkingweekly.com
On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy [email protected] wrote:
What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work?
Like,
- at least 100,000 people in a 5 mile radius
- at least 100,000 small businesses in a 5 mile radius
etc.
Thanks!
Cassidy
–
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The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
I know this isn’t exactly what you’re asking, but Alex’s post reminded me of one of the most interesting and unexpected things I’ve found since we opened our space nearly 3 years ago. I expected that we would have around 80% of our members coming from the immediate neighborhood, but I’ve found that people are more than willing to commute if the place they’re commuting to is a place they enjoy working. I just took a quick scan of our member roster and less than a quarter of our members live in what I would consider the neighborhood of either of our spaces. Several of those 25% are in the neighborhood because they’ve specifically moved here after joining us, which is even more incredible.
So yeah, it’s not necessarily about proximity as much as what you’re offering and the kind of community you’re cultivating.
···
On Wednesday, April 1, 2015 at 9:44:02 PM UTC-4, Alex Hillman wrote:
How many people are in a radius doesn’t really matter, if none of those people care about or need Coworking.
We did something counterintuitive when we began: we put Indy Hall in a place where NONE of our community members already were. We chose a neighborhood that was easily accessible my public transit (something important to our community), but all of our early members lived in 3 main parts of the city and we chose to open in an area that was relatively central to all 3. If we had picked any one of those three parts, the other 2/3rds of our community would’ve felt more disconnected.
Bur I say relative because that’s important. There is ALWAYS someone who will say that you’re too far away. In our case, that can be as “far away” as 4 subway stops. It depends on what people are used to.
All of this stems from answering a bigger question and asking: who are your members? Not a demographic, or people you hope to reach…but who are the ACTUAL people that you CAN reach. Where are they, and where do they already go? Do they cross neighborhoods? How do they get there? What kind of work do they do? Can they work from anywhere? Do they have the power to choose where they work? Do they like the way they work, or is there a problem or set of problems?
I’m a HUGE supporter of doing pop-up Coworking (aka Jelly, workatjelly.com) for a while before selecting any space because it’s the ideal way of seeing who actually shows up, and where, and most importantly WHY. Is it because they need a place to work? Or…is it because they’re lonely at home and cafes are awkward to be a professional.
And you can find all of that our before ever wasting time on finding the “perfect” location (which doesn’t exist, that’s a fantasy) and without spending a dollar, unsure if you’ll ever see that dollar again.
-Alex
The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://listen.coworkingweekly.com
On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy [email protected] wrote:
What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work?
Like,
- at least 100,000 people in a 5 mile radius
- at least 100,000 small businesses in a 5 mile radius
etc.
Thanks!
Cassidy
–
Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected].
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
–
The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
Yeah, big +1 to that.
We have done some research into the reasons people join and stay, and location/proximity are consistently WAY lower on the top 10 list than anybody expects.
That data (and more) can be found in this synthesis: http://www.slideshare.net/mobile/alexknowshtml/quantifying-community-how-we-measure-success-in-a-coworking-space
I also had a couple of academic researchers on my podcast recently who found that things like “proximity” are far less indicators of people choosing coworking, since the people who choose it generally have workspace alternatives that are closer than the one they end up joining and paying for.
Location matters, but it matters a lot less than you might think if you’re actually solving a problem for people.
-Alex
···
On Thursday, April 2, 2015, Andy Soell [email protected] wrote:
I know this isn’t exactly what you’re asking, but Alex’s post reminded me of one of the most interesting and unexpected things I’ve found since we opened our space nearly 3 years ago. I expected that we would have around 80% of our members coming from the immediate neighborhood, but I’ve found that people are more than willing to commute if the place they’re commuting to is a place they enjoy working. I just took a quick scan of our member roster and less than a quarter of our members live in what I would consider the neighborhood of either of our spaces. Several of those 25% are in the neighborhood because they’ve specifically moved here after joining us, which is even more incredible.
So yeah, it’s not necessarily about proximity as much as what you’re offering and the kind of community you’re cultivating.
On Wednesday, April 1, 2015 at 9:44:02 PM UTC-4, Alex Hillman wrote:
How many people are in a radius doesn’t really matter, if none of those people care about or need Coworking.
We did something counterintuitive when we began: we put Indy Hall in a place where NONE of our community members already were. We chose a neighborhood that was easily accessible my public transit (something important to our community), but all of our early members lived in 3 main parts of the city and we chose to open in an area that was relatively central to all 3. If we had picked any one of those three parts, the other 2/3rds of our community would’ve felt more disconnected.
Bur I say relative because that’s important. There is ALWAYS someone who will say that you’re too far away. In our case, that can be as “far away” as 4 subway stops. It depends on what people are used to.
All of this stems from answering a bigger question and asking: who are your members? Not a demographic, or people you hope to reach…but who are the ACTUAL people that you CAN reach. Where are they, and where do they already go? Do they cross neighborhoods? How do they get there? What kind of work do they do? Can they work from anywhere? Do they have the power to choose where they work? Do they like the way they work, or is there a problem or set of problems?
I’m a HUGE supporter of doing pop-up Coworking (aka Jelly, workatjelly.com) for a while before selecting any space because it’s the ideal way of seeing who actually shows up, and where, and most importantly WHY. Is it because they need a place to work? Or…is it because they’re lonely at home and cafes are awkward to be a professional.
And you can find all of that our before ever wasting time on finding the “perfect” location (which doesn’t exist, that’s a fantasy) and without spending a dollar, unsure if you’ll ever see that dollar again.
-Alex
The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://listen.coworkingweekly.com
On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy [email protected] wrote:
What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work?
Like,
- at least 100,000 people in a 5 mile radius
- at least 100,000 small businesses in a 5 mile radius
etc.
Thanks!
Cassidy
–
Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected].
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
–
The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
–
Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.
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For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
–
The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
This is a common question and something important to not only ask but discover by talking to and testing people as Andy and Alex have recommended. We found that our neighborhood is important because it’s where people live. Creative Density is in the first ring of neighborhoods around the Central Business District where it’s still dense but neighborhood-y. We also found that our location matters to how your members will commute. The general rule of thumb from studies is around 22 minutes of commute. I found this number to accurate. Most of members live within 22 minutes be it walking, biking, or driving. We have a few that travel a bit further but that’s only 5% of our community.
I have noticed that for private offices with teams in Denver then there are a few things that our collective coworking community has noticed. However, if you are located right downtown then they assume they will pay for parking and highly value the location. The downtown Denver shared spaces are office heavy and have been successful with offices but not with traditional coworking. There are several reasons for this but that is a whole other discussion but I just wanted to share that note.
What I will list is instead things that make our community stronger because of our location:
- Front yard. We play a lot of yard games and it’s a great activator to creating our community and integrating new members.
- Walkable lunch spots. We have fast food, delis, and sit down places all nearby. We do take-yourself-to-lunch-Fridays that has been a key community builder for us.
- Street parking is available. Denver is a car city still so even 2 hour free parking right outside our door helps us attract people that don’t want to walk or bike to work. About half of our community members drive.
- Patios. They’re friendly and help people have casual conversation.
I hope this helps.
This is great stuff in your slideshare. Thanks for sharing!
···
On Thursday, April 2, 2015 at 8:48:42 AM UTC-5, Alex Hillman wrote:
Yeah, big +1 to that.
We have done some research into the reasons people join and stay, and location/proximity are consistently WAY lower on the top 10 list than anybody expects.
That data (and more) can be found in this synthesis: http://www.slideshare.net/mobile/alexknowshtml/quantifying-community-how-we-measure-success-in-a-coworking-space
I also had a couple of academic researchers on my podcast recently who found that things like “proximity” are far less indicators of people choosing coworking, since the people who choose it generally have workspace alternatives that are closer than the one they end up joining and paying for.
Location matters, but it matters a lot less than you might think if you’re actually solving a problem for people.
-Alex
On Thursday, April 2, 2015, Andy Soell [email protected] wrote:
I know this isn’t exactly what you’re asking, but Alex’s post reminded me of one of the most interesting and unexpected things I’ve found since we opened our space nearly 3 years ago. I expected that we would have around 80% of our members coming from the immediate neighborhood, but I’ve found that people are more than willing to commute if the place they’re commuting to is a place they enjoy working. I just took a quick scan of our member roster and less than a quarter of our members live in what I would consider the neighborhood of either of our spaces. Several of those 25% are in the neighborhood because they’ve specifically moved here after joining us, which is even more incredible.
So yeah, it’s not necessarily about proximity as much as what you’re offering and the kind of community you’re cultivating.
On Wednesday, April 1, 2015 at 9:44:02 PM UTC-4, Alex Hillman wrote:
How many people are in a radius doesn’t really matter, if none of those people care about or need Coworking.
We did something counterintuitive when we began: we put Indy Hall in a place where NONE of our community members already were. We chose a neighborhood that was easily accessible my public transit (something important to our community), but all of our early members lived in 3 main parts of the city and we chose to open in an area that was relatively central to all 3. If we had picked any one of those three parts, the other 2/3rds of our community would’ve felt more disconnected.
Bur I say relative because that’s important. There is ALWAYS someone who will say that you’re too far away. In our case, that can be as “far away” as 4 subway stops. It depends on what people are used to.
All of this stems from answering a bigger question and asking: who are your members? Not a demographic, or people you hope to reach…but who are the ACTUAL people that you CAN reach. Where are they, and where do they already go? Do they cross neighborhoods? How do they get there? What kind of work do they do? Can they work from anywhere? Do they have the power to choose where they work? Do they like the way they work, or is there a problem or set of problems?
I’m a HUGE supporter of doing pop-up Coworking (aka Jelly, workatjelly.com) for a while before selecting any space because it’s the ideal way of seeing who actually shows up, and where, and most importantly WHY. Is it because they need a place to work? Or…is it because they’re lonely at home and cafes are awkward to be a professional.
And you can find all of that our before ever wasting time on finding the “perfect” location (which doesn’t exist, that’s a fantasy) and without spending a dollar, unsure if you’ll ever see that dollar again.
-Alex
The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://listen.coworkingweekly.com
On Wednesday, April 1, 2015, Cassidy [email protected] wrote:
What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work?
Like,
- at least 100,000 people in a 5 mile radius
- at least 100,000 small businesses in a 5 mile radius
etc.
Thanks!
Cassidy
–
Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected].
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
–
The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
–
Visit this forum on the web at http://discuss.coworking.com
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups “Coworking” group.
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The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.
Join the list: http://coworkingweekly.com
Listen to the podcast: http://dangerouslyawesome.com/podcast
GeniusDen.com - located in Deep Ellum - Downtown Dallas, old brick neighborhood, walking to bars, restaurants, music venues - stuff creative independent people like to do.
We have free on-street parking - big friction point for other co-working spaces in Dallas Downtown.
We built out bigger offices, nicer finishes, better sound system and lighting.
Now we just need to get the word out and more people in here to see the space and make their decision.
Location: be 5 to 20 minutes from your workers.
Be in a cool walkable place with attractions nearby.
Be accessible to members and their guests.
Build it nice - be a cool place to “be” when they get there.
Get the word out…
best of luck Cassidy,
Joe Payton
···
On Wednesday, April 1, 2015 at 8:11:17 PM UTC-5, Cassidy wrote:
What metrics do you all gauge to decide whether a location will work?
Like,
- at least 100,000 people in a 5 mile radius
- at least 100,000 small businesses in a 5 mile radius
etc.
Thanks!
Cassidy
I just asked the same thing of my cowork community, small but growing. Although not even close to statistically relevant numbers, all of them said proximity to food and beverage were paramount - meaning a very short car ride and/or walk to was best.
- 43% proximity to food and beverage
- 29% parking availability
- 14% easy access in/out of parking lot; and commute time
- 0% access to I-35 (the highway arterial) - boy I was wrong about this one!
Now Alex and many others advocate for pop-up coworks and I’ve done that pretty consistently through the past year and it hasn’t gleaned as much as I would have expected. I’ve had more luck with a Meetup that brought together cowork mornings and other types of events together under one umbrella, as a community builder. I’m in a community that doesn’t know coworking (we’re outside of Austin, home to 27 cowork spaces) and the past year has been an educational and advocacy period. Of the 4 major cities in this county, two have viable downtowns, but all are cost prohibitive. I’m considering the location of large neighborhoods that have work at home populations and just today, tapped into that community via Facebook. (25% of our cowork community is from that area).
I also chose the city (of Round Rock) because it has a vibrant economic community (and I’m a member of their Chamber). The city and Chamber had been considering a cowork space for years, but dropped it and it had a jelly for a few years, that petered out in 2012 (which we’re trying to revive).
My approach to starting a cowork is like farming: seed community members grow other members.
Jen