Q&A with Greg Beadle at The Bureaux on the shared workspace concept

Tell us about The Bureaux concept. What is it and what makes it different?

We've taken the traditional office lease concept and relaxed the rules to make it more user-friendly to small businesses and startups, who don't want to commit to long leases and a host of additional services costs. Secondly we've looked at what the global trends are in terms of creative collaboration and downsizing workspaces for optimum efficiencies.

The Bureaux is a simple, flexible office solution to any small to medium size business that needs productive, well-located work space with flexible terms.

Basically the Bureaux offers affordable space, from hot desks to private office suites, to businesses that are to starting out in the Cape Town market, expanding or consolidating, with easy lease terms that are flexible enough to accommodate their growth plans.

The first aspect of The Bureaux that tenants love is paying one price with all services included. The monthly rental amount includes use of shared meeting, rooms, connectivity to uncapped high speed internet, electricity, cleaning, access to kitchen facilities, as well as 24/7 secure access to the workplace. We have chosen City Fibre supplied by RSAWeb as the source of our internet supply in all our buildings, ensuring our high speed internet runs above 20Mb/sec with a current maximum speed of 100Mb/sec. The concept is very accessible to startups who need to get out of their homes and garages with leases run from R1,500 per month for desk space and R5,500 per private air conditioned office suite.

We've totally relaxed the rules of renting office space. Flexible terms help new tenants overcome commitment phobia. Allocated desk spaces are available on a month to month rental contract. This allows a production team to rent additional desk as and when they need to pull in a team of people for a project. Even our private office suites work on three-month notice. Our spaces are designed to allow private office suite tenants access to allocated desk space areas, ensuring best possible flexibility to dynamic changes in size of their productive workforce.

Environment and workplace culture influence where people choose to situate their offices, and we have been very careful in choosing vibrant locations that offer great places and spaces to have coffee, exercise and socialise nearby.

How does The Bureaux link to global office space trends? What key trends are you following?

The global trend sees workplace sizes shrinking as living spaces tend to shrink and the power of corporations is rather rapidly shifting to the individual. Everything is online, everyone can work from anywhere. Shared desk spaces are sprouting up all over the world. Wework.com are building skyscrapers all over the United States and creeping into Europe. Shared office space is the future of the way we will work. We follow international trends with an acute awareness to the differences our local market requires versus the international market. Most South Africans still subconciously feel more comfortable with a more private work space than working across a desk from a total stranger and we ensure our spaces subtly produce the harmony to suit most people's workspace requirements.

Another prevalent trend: entrepreneurs are tired of working in their pyjamas. Working from home for the majority of trepid entrepreneurs means blurred lines of home duty vs work efforts. Sitting at the kitchen counter wading through e mails while thinking about the washing machine. Separating home and work environments finally arises as an idea and then we visit Google to see what its going to cost per month to have to wear non-sleepwear during the day going forward into the world of increased productivity and more peaceful home environment.

What are your sources of inspiration?

My sources of inspiration come from an interest in architecture, spatial planning and puzzle solving as well as a passion for the service industry as a whole. Listening is so important in this and most other service industries. Giving clients what they need and more is the solution. Create a great space that maximises peoples productivity and enjoyment of their work life but also makes business sense for yourself.

What do your tenants really want? What are they buying into?

Bureaux tenants really want an affordable work space that allows them 24/7 access, uncapped high speed internet at a location convenient to their personal and business needs.

Why have you developed The Bureaux concept and where do you see it going? How much has it grown already and any plans in the pipeline?

The Bureaux started as a casual decision to take up an office space at The Woodstock Exchange to share with a few friends. I was part of the development team of The Woodstock Exchange and decided rather haphazadly to take an office space, knowing that there was a great future ahead for this cleverly curated creative hub. As tenants chose to move on from the Exchange to larger spaces elsewhere I took over spaces one by one to form what is now over 2,000sqm in this building. By carefully juggling cashflow and some negotiated leniency from the landlord, I was allowed to organically grow my business based on a growing demand. With a hunger to expand I fortuitously sat next to one of my now business partners at a start up conference and we realised there was great synergy. Within a few months we had agreed to join forces and expand the Bureaux into the newly developed Point Centre on Regent Road, Sea Point. One unit consisting of 14 privates suites became 3 units, within a few months, and we now have 30 private office suites, 40 allocated desks and 3 shared meeting rooms with an occupancy of 80% (within first month of opening units 2 and 3).

Simultaneously we have opened The Bureaux I City Junction at 42 Hans Strydom on the Cape Town foreshore at the junction of the N1, N2, Helen Susman Boulevard and Hans Strydom Avenue. Situated in the historical Imperial Cold Storage building, oversized wooden sash windows and a victorian styled balcony ensure a unique character to this Bureaux offering. Two advertising agencies, both spearheaded by well known industry leaders have taken residence here. A modelling agency and production company, not forgetting a wireless network analytics company and a building designer/contractor have also alreadt taken space. Occupancy is at 90% in month one.

Next we are looking to expand our offering in the City of Cape Town as well as reach into the Southern Suburbs early next year. Woodstock still has plenty of potential and is important to us.

What are your views on the Cape Town commercial property market and entrepreneurship?

According to expert opinion there are currently over 20 buildings in the Cape Town CBD each offering over 1,000sqm in available space. Most demands for office space in Cape Town, according to the same source, are for spaces between 100-300sqm. This gap in supply and demand will naturally adjust. I believe there will be an increase in the amount of residential space in the city due to demand and some of these large spaces suitable to residential development. Triangle House is a great example of this where a leading hotel group is believed to be taking the lower section of the building as a hotel with serviced apartments above and residential apartments taking up the top section, on the corner of Loop and Riebeek streets.

It seems that property funds play with large buildings as balance sheet chess pieces while landlords who creatively curate their buildings and have their fingers on the pulse will always be ahead of the game.

The beauty of Cape Town is that there are definite locations that work for what we do. Once you understand which of these locations will work best it comes down to the ideal location that ticks all our boxes for success. We would rather wait for the right opportunity than make haste to try gain market share in a specific area before a competitor takes up space there.

The client will always win. With flexible terms and particularly for desk users, thee client can move around from service provider to service provider until they find the perfect offering in the perfect environment. We have many new clients moving across from competitors based on our pricing, services, location, aesthetics and flexibility.

Entrepreneurship is on the rise. Start ups battle to afford any costs before they secure funding.

It's great to see entreprenurial development programs affording startups the opportunity to develop their dreams in a productive environment without any cost until they can afford to take up space elsewhere. We encourage these programs and are currently exploring ways in which we can assist and add value to these fantastic initiatives.

What gets you out of bed in the morning?

What wakes me up in the night and is foremost in my business mind in the morning are ideas of how to further optimise our market offering as well as how to ensure we are coming up with solutions for our clients before they require them. One morning I awoke at 2am with the concept for the initial Bureau, specifically for photographers. I got out of bed, noted down my thoughts for an hour or so and that became the backbone of what makes up The Bureaux today.

I do often feel like I am managing a hotel rather than a serviced office space business. Your guests need to score you highly on that satisfaction index daily. At the end of the day, our best marketing tool is word of mouth and we pride ourselves on client satisfaction.

For more information, visit www.thebureaux.co.za.