As I reflect on Coworking on 15th’s 10-year anniversary, the book Antifragile by one of my favorite authors, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, comes to mind. In his fourth book, Taleb explains the concept of certain businesses being the opposite of fragile. Beyond robust or resilient companies, these firms benefit from disruption and turmoil, enabling them to prosper in difficult times.
Looking back over the past 10 years in the Valley, so many coworking spaces have come and gone—from smaller spaces with legal troubles to a massive coworking company (WeWork) that scaled aggressively before recently filing for bankruptcy. While WeWork still has a lingering physical footprint in Phoenix, its future is obviously in peril. In addition to these memorable Phoenix coworking failures, there are others that folded under competitive pressures, COVID, the economic downturn, or a combination of factors. The remnants of these past coworking spaces might still be on the building facade, but nobody really remembers them.
Coworking on 15th has always been a simple place.
Never meant to be flashy or fancy, our space delivers a quiet, comfortable place to work that appeals to long-term renters—some working out of the space for as long as 7 years. The space is clean, the internet is fast, and the people are nice. On the business side, our model doesn’t require much attention.
So as I write about what it takes to make it 10 years in the coworking business, I credit a focus on the core elements and on not being ‘fragile‘. We own the building, utilize a no-cost property management platform, and maintain competitive, flexible pricing with month-to-month terms. These elements afforded us flexibility during COVID when we had renters ask for a temporary pause on rent and we were able to say yes.
More recently, we’ve seen an increase in demand for private office spaces. While we are working on adding an additional 1,000 sqft buildout to the building long term, we found a faster solution by installing doors and partial walls to create two private offices within our existing space.
Ten years in and another ten ahead.
One factor pointing to our continued success is the ‘Lindy Effect.’ A popular theory which concludes that the longer a business has existed, the increased likelihood that it will continue to exist in the future. We are proud to celebrate 10 years of stable coworking in the Midtown Phoenix neighborhood and plan to stick around for at least another 10.
Stay tuned for our 2033 update. In the meantime, if you or a friend needs a shared working space or private office, please reach out. We will be here.
—– Pics below here of our history
