An oldey but goody from the Business Pundit blog.

Coworking vs. the Coffee Shop: Who Wins? | Business Pundit

Enjoy!

We dodged the blizzard conditions the folks in the northeast had for their last-shopping-weekend-before-Christmas. But, hey, we’re all busy right? So if you need something for the solo entrepreneur or digital nomad in your life here are a few ideas.

• Kensington Cable Lock; I’ve had one of these for a few years and it has given me the extra confidence to go to the bathroom at a coworking space or coffee shop without bringing my laptop along. (Eww.)
• 5 Day Daily Desk Pass: This is perfect top make a person’s New Year’s resolution come true. What better way to give someone’s business a jumpstart than by  connecting with others down at C4 Workspace. Makes a great stocking stuffer
• Noise Canceling Headphones: Who invented these? Can I send them a check? Whether you’re traveling, working at home (tunes out the kids AND the washing machine), coworking or coffee shopping these are a godsend. Go for the Bose for the Extra special person in your life or look for a nice pair of Sony’s.
• C4 Workspace Annual Membership: All year access to member rates and events at San Antonio’s first coworking space. It comes with 2 Daily Desk Passes and there’s a cool Member Card with discounts to restaurants, theatres and businesses in Southtown and beyond

‘Tis the season!

Coworking is spreading. In fact, it might be a good way to stay warm in the northern climes.

CoCo will be opening in St. Paul Minnesota sometime in January. They have a very cool, 3 story space. Check out the video.

Web Worker Daily put up this post afew days ago, Justifying Coworking As an Investment. It flashed across the coworkingverse like wildfire and it has some great points.

We’re always looking for information about coworking that we can share. But I thought it might be good to make this one relevant to C⁴ Workspace. So here goes.

Point by Point

WWD laid the post out in three points.

Step 1: Identify What You Have to Gain from Coworking
We like to think of these in terms of our name:

• Collaboration
• Cooperation
• Community
• Connection

Put those together and you have what we could call “opportunity investment.”

Step 2: Assess the Risks and Costs Associated with Coworking
WWD didn’t really address the “risk” part of that so we will. The biggest risk of coworking is that you will run into someone who isn’t about the community so much as about themselves. They could steal an idea or a client. This is a case of what I call the 99-1 rule. Don’t spend all you time planning and worrying about the 1% of worst case scenarios. Plan for the 99% you’ll run into and deal with the 1% when they come along. You are more likely to have an idea or client stolen at a coffee shop by someone you don’t know eavesdropping on your conversation. (We take the “Co-” in community seriously. If you need a private conversation speak more softly or use a one of the phone rooms.)

Costs always have to be considered. It was one of the first things we thought of when we stated to think about opening a space: will people pay for professional workspace? We answered it in one of our initial presentation slides titled “Whadya Nuts?”. The answer is that as a small business or a freelance or solo you have no choice but to grow your business, especially in a down economy. To grow you will need to attract new clients and appear more professional than the next guy. That requires an investment in time and money.

You also have to consider what operating out of your home costs you now. You’re driving to meet clients. If you work (ethically) in a coffee shop you’re buying drinks and food. You’re paying for WiFi in some fashion. So, add up those hard costs for gas, drive time, WiFi, food and drink. You probably spend about $20 a day for little to no privacy, no connection to others, noisy meeting space and overpriced WiFi and beverages.

Coworking at C⁴ Workspace starts at $20 a day and goes down from there. Last I checked Starbucks didn’t give you volume discounts on lattes.

Step 3: Make an Informed Decision

Absolutely. The best way to do that is to “try before you buy”. Drop in on the Second Thursday for Jelly San Antonio all day free coworking. Better yet, just drop in and sit down. Talk to us about what you need and we can work something out. Remember, it’s all about the community. Essentially, everyone is a customer, a participant, a contributor. Even us.

No Hard Sell

Because it’s not necessary. Try coworking one day and you’ll be hooked. Yes, it costs money and money is dear right now. But if you are serious about your business and want to be a player in our economic ecosystem we think it’s an investment worth making.

What a great tagline for coworking! Solo, But Not Alone from Entrepreneur.com hits it on the head.

A few of my favorite quotes…

“The appeal of co-working seems clear: It provides people … a professional and social package that most alternatives can’t match”

“…what makes co-working alluring (is) the cooperative spirit and community vibe fostered by the people who populate those spaces.”

“Isolation…is an inconvenient byproduct of the concept of home-office convenience.”

“…the problem with working from home wasn’t just the distractions, it was the sense of physical and mental separation.”

Shared desk spaces like C⁴ Workspace are cropping up around the world. Coworking spaces have successfully connected small businesses with other small businesses. Businesses can’t grow without connection. Think hard and realistically about how well your existing network is helping your business grow. Wouldn’t an expansion of your network make your business grow even faster?

So, what’s up San Antonio?

Does coworking just sound cool, but for you not so much? Are you afraid a fellow coworker will swipe some business from you? BTW, the antithesis of coworking. Are you shy and don’t like meeting new people? Are you afraid of downtown and all that parking hassle?

C⁴ Workspace was created to “build a sustainable professional community.” The community that works here loves it, but most people who think it’s “cool” have never tried it. If you’ve attended an event here that’s nothing like working in the space. Besides the jazz music in the background and keyboard clicks it’s pretty darn quiet. Parking is free. We’re one mile from the major highways downtown. The space (if I may say so myself) is the coolest looking office in town.

So, what’s up San Antonio? We’d like to know. Please leave a comment and tell us what you think.

Bruce Eric Anderson (@bruceericatdell) visited us at the beginning of August to get some work done while his family was out to play at SeaWorld. Bruce is a blogger at DigitalNomads (@digital_nomads), a community site for individuals that work or play without regard for their physical location Powered by Dell.

We were included in his first anniversary post, One Year of Digital Nomads, for Digital Nomads which we consider quite an honor. He wrote some very kind words about us…

Asked what my ideal workspace would look like today and I’d describe a workspace with no walls, large open-air spaces with lots of open tables for impromptu meetings and team collaboration. I’d also be listening to Nature Sounds Radio on Pandora in a set of noise canceling headphones to block out the “loud laughers” that invariably would find me where ever I sat.

It would look very much like a place I worked out of a few weeks ago while spending some time in San Antonio with my family.

And Bruce shot a video of Todd giving a tour. Check it out!

Thanks Bruce!

[Note to self: Begin diet today.]

In our continued effort to provide information (and proselytize) about coworking we offer up this presentation from the folks at Carrboro Coworking in North Carolina.

Couldn’t have said it better myself.

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I left my heart in Orange County. In California. Yes, the one with the Real Housewives. But I don’t know any of them.

But “The OC” is also home to CoworkingFullerton and Marieke Hensel. She recently gave this presentation at LaidOffCamp in LA. Enjoy!

How can you not like this? She’s Dutch. Like in “It ain’t much if it ain’t Dutch.”

Cheers!
Todd (VanderVliet) O’Neill

It takes all kinds of people to build a coworking community.Sometimes it takes just one gender.

Check out this New York Times article, An Office Space of One’s Own for Entrepreneurs, about consulting firm In Good Company and their women only coworking space.

The space is beautiful and the concept is unique.

[Thanks to Patricio Espinosa (@espiblog) for the pointer.]