On Site Update: Our Visit to Chicago

My wife & I love Chicago.

Something about the city life & the people that live there. It’s just a great place to visit and as it’s only 6 hours away, my wife & I visit often.

I had done a bit of research before our last trip and discovered Ravenswood Coworking in the Ravenswood (no duh) neighborhood of Chicago. I sent an email to the founder, Jeff Park and asked if I could take a tour.

Jeff was extremely gracious and gave us about 45 minutes of his time to show us around, share their experiences, and generally rave about the concept of coworking. He had some great stories to tell about some of the characters they’ve met since opening. Read more

What do we do about the kids?

I noticed over the last few months that as I would talk with people about coworking, someone would ask about the idea of adding day care services.

I got very excited by the idea. Especially after reading about Cubes & Crayons in California. From a market demographic standpoint, it makes a lot of sense. More and more microbusinesses are parents, (ok, mostly moms), working out of their home.

You want your kid close, but not so close that you can’t focus on the business.

We were thinking the perfect solution would be to combine the the coworking facility with a day care service all in the same building.

Have a meeting? Need to focus? Just need some adult time?

Take your kid to the office and let the day care downstairs watch them while you get stuff done. No having to run across town or make special last minute arrangements.

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Location Shopping Update…

Spent some time this week zeroing in on locations. I toured 4 locations. 3 in Cuyahoga Falls, 1 in Akron.

I toured the 1 United Building in Akron. It’s a beautiful location right in the historic district of downtown Akron. Beautiful outside, although inside it felt very ‘corporate’.

Still, the surrounding area is cool - with Mocha Maiden, Crave & the Chop House right across the street…and an Einstein’s Bagel Bros on the corner.

The only problem was the cost. The cost per square foot and charges for parking — I think it would make the membership fees cost prohibitive for our target market.

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A Little Love for Our Local Chambers…

We had two really great meetings this week.

One with Laura Petrella, CEO of the Cuyahoga Falls Chamber of Commerce and one with Patricia Pell, Home business Network Leader & Brad Nellis, Director of Member Networks for COSE (Council of Smaller Enterprises).

Cuyahoga Falls Chamber

Laura was extremely helpful. No sooner had we left the meeting than she had several emails waiting for me in my inbox — all pointing me to local lots that were available and city programs designed to encourage economic growth in downtown Cuyahoga Falls. Stuff that would have taken us hours to track down ourselves, she was able to zero in on immediately.

She understood the concept of coworking and immediately got it.

That and Laura is just an extremely savvy & gregarious person. It was kind of cool because she mentioned she was reading Malcom Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, one of my favorites. We quickly agreed she was a ‘connector’ — someone who’s able to bring people together to make things happen — to paraphrase Gladwell.
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Location, Location, Location…

We’re currently working on our business plan here and making pretty good progress.

In fact, I should be working on it now. But thought I’d give everyone a quick update.

I’ve got two meetings this week with local chambers of commerce. I have to say, the people I’ve spoken with so far have been extremely helpful and very open to talking about the concept.

I mean I know we’re excited about the idea, but based on initial feedback it’s safe to say the business community ‘gets it.’

It only makes sense, Co-working in Northeast Ohio — whether its in Akron, Canton, Cleveland or Cuyahoga Falls — is good for business. Small business owners can step out of the isolation of working at home or in their local coffee shop. Interaction, networking and true business bonds are forged when people work together.

The hard part at this point, deciding where we’ll open our first location.
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A Market Research Study…

I’m in the midst of gaging local interest in a co-working facility for Northeast Ohio.

So I’m doing some initial market research.

You may find some of my friends at local coffee shops doing surveys, but we’ve also put together an online survey as well.

If you’ve got 5 minutes and can help us out by filling out this survey, it’d be greatly appreciated. Not to mention, you could win an Apple iTouch (1 in every 100 respondents will win).

To be eligible, you just need to be work out of your home and live in Ohio.

Take our survey now.

Making the ‘Go’ Decision

I’ve worked out of my home for the past 5 years.

While it’s been great on many fronts, I have to admit I get a little stir crazy. Sometimes I’ll just grab my laptop and go work at my local Starbucks, Panera or pub.

I enjoy it because it gets me out in front of people, but if I had to make a phone call or print something up — I’d have to head home again. I love getting out but these places just are NOT conducive to a productive work environment.

So I started looking around a bit and discovered the whole world of Co-Working.

And MAN - I was INSTANTLY in love. I was craving for something like this to open locally but alas no one has made the move in NEO.

What really got a fire in my belly about it was an interview I did with Susan Evans, Co-Founder of Office Nomads on my other blog, Small Business Guru.

After talking with her, I was SOLD.

So seeing a need and sensing a business opportunity, I started researching it more actively. So much so my wife & I found ourselves writing a business plan, scouting locations, and chatting up investors and our local chambers of commerce to get this off the ground.

So here I am, writing about this exciting endeavor and looking for local cohorts.

I’ll be documenting our progress, what we’ve learned, and what we’re doing to make this happen. Hopefully we’ll gain enough local interest to make our final ‘go’ decision.

In the meantime, I hope you enjoy following along and look forward to hearing from you if you’d like to be a part of the process.