209. Get SUPER certified for reducing single-use plastic in your coworking business

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209. Get SUPER certified for reducing single-use plastic in your coworking business

00:00:01 Welcome to the everything co-working podcast, where you learn what you need to know about how the world wants to work. And now your host coworking space owner and trend expert. Jamie Russo. Welcome to the everything coworking podcast. This is your host. Jamie Rousseau. Thank you for listening. I know lots of you listen every week to anybody who is new.

00:00:37 Welcome to our community. We're glad to have you here. So I want to do a quick check-in. I'm just going to pretend we're having a conversation, even though I'm only talking into my microphone, come join us in our Facebook group to have a conversation, you can find us at everything, coworking club.com or just search for us on Facebook. So what's happening out there.

00:00:59 It's summer, we've talked on recent episodes about it getting quieter. I will tell you, in my flight group calls last was it last week. I always do them the first week of the month, but the first week was a little wonky this year, this month. So I think it was last week. Lots of really great indicators. One woman said if it's this busy during the summer buckle up for September.

00:01:25 And that is what we like to hear at another woman who was at 38% occupancy in February, and she's at 85% occupancy. Now she's a lot of offices to fill. So there's a lot of activity out there. I will say, of course, everybody asked her, what are you doing? What are you doing that changed? Did she said, I'm just doing the things I'm doing,

00:01:48 all the activities that I'm consistent on. And it's just that demand is finally picking up. And so you can't put the ball down, you know, for a minute, you gotta, you know, keep your foot on the pedal and keep doing the things even when you're out on summer vacation and whatnot, because the activity is happening, which is awesome.

00:02:12 I have heard of a lot of demand for team spaces in somewhat unusual markets, even smaller markets. I think that's a really interesting indicator. You know, we're starting to see some of that. Okay. We're going to, you know, put our remote teams, you know, in a flex space. My husband actually just took a new job. He's at home all that time.

00:02:39 If anybody can relate to this. So we have our own offices, although I'd need to just join, join a coworking space I've been waiting for. I don't know. Well, I, I don't know what I've been waiting for. I gotta get out. Oh, I have a note on that in a second, but he's been working at home every day and he just went on a business trip for the first time to his new.

00:02:59 And my daughter said something about, you know, missing him. He said, I think he asked my daughter if she was gonna miss him while he was gone. And of course she said, yes. And I said, I'm not going to miss you at all. I know that's not very nice, but I kind of, you know, I need a little break.

00:03:14 Absence makes the heart grow fonder. Right. Lot of together time. So anyway, his new company works out of a shared biotech space in Seattle. He sent me the link and I was like, Hey, this is a coworking space for biotech. And they have to find their own space. Cause I think they're out of space. Their team is growing,

00:03:35 but it looks very cool, very high-end and very specialized because they have lab space there. And he was curious about his company, like has never been in the same place, it's small company. And so they had to get their COVID procedures in place. And so he was trying to figure that out. And I said, well, probably your workspace has that all handled.

00:03:57 And speaking of which I wanted to give another kind of, you know, industry Intel, which is I'm getting reports from our flight group members or community manager university folks that they have members that are reporting that they have tested positive for COVID even though they've been vaccinated. So be prepared for that. You know, we have a family friend that's a doctor and she said,

00:04:25 you know, some of it's math, some of it could be the variant. Some of it's math that the vaccine is not a hundred percent effective. So some people that get vaccinated are going to get COVID. And so, you know, you kind of have to keep your protocols in place. Of course you may have folks that are not vaccinated and without the social distancing and masks,

00:04:46 you know, it's just easier to spread once it happened. So keep be ready, you know, keep the communication in place, continue to be transparent. The folks that have reported have said, you know, they've immediately gone out to their membership and let them know about the case when that person was in the space, et cetera. And folks really appreciate the notification,

00:05:08 the ability to, you know, know and have that transparency so they can go get tested or, you know, however they want to respond to that personally. So just keep your sanitation policies in place and be ready and, you know, continue to be transparent, continue to let your know your members know, you know, what to expect and what you have in place.

00:05:30 So I was listening to yes, today on my way to the gym. So I've talked a little bit about how, you know, it's been sort of a good, you know, insight for me to think about the, you know, sort of removing the, or, or restarting the inertia of leaving the house to work out. So during COVID my CrossFit gym closed completely to open again.

00:05:58 And so I've been working out at home and I had joined a new gym it's 20 minutes away, which is, you know, kind of a thing because I kind of run my day. Pretty tightly is like, just like you do got a lot of stuff to do. So I don't like to spend 20 minutes driving to the gym. And so I was kinda,

00:06:17 you know, been pokey about going and I keep working out at home. So I did this two day competition at the end of may, which was hard and tiring. And I think I just kind of, after that, lost a little of my momentum, which is quite rare for me. And I wear a heart rate monitor when I work out,

00:06:37 which I love. And it gives you, you know, the color coded how hard you worked indicators. So blue, green, yellow, red, and at home lately, I never go to the red. It's been even days where I don't get much yellow and you really want to be working in the yellow and a couple of days a week, you should go red because you're working really hard and you need to know what that feels like if you're going to compete.

00:07:01 And I like to compete here and there. And so I finally realized, you know, I don't identify with slacking. And so I need to get my butt to the gym because when I go to the CrossFit gym, there are other people there and there are coaches there and I respond very well to competition and eyeballs. And so I will work hard when I'm competing against other people.

00:07:27 So I went this morning, you know, and I was listening to the podcast on the way, but I was in the red for a long time. It's a very hard workout. And it was great. There's a guy in front of me on the run and I was chasing him. And then we had, you know, for my CrossFitters, with them,

00:07:42 power snatches and overhead squats and box jumps over after that, after some really hard, heavy backs back squat waves. But anyway, related to this, I shared this because on the way to the gym I was listening to, it was actually a real estate investing podcast. And the actually was a book. It was a book about real estate investing. And the author is a Keller Williams.

00:08:08 What do you call it? He's an agent, but he owns an agency. I'm sure there's a better term for that. And you're talking about the training that Keller Williams Dunn has done. And Mark Willis, who was used to be the CEO of Keller Williams has been on the podcast and he is phenomenal. And he does his own work now and sort of leadership and real estate.

00:08:28 So if you're interested, you should find him and follow him, but they do phenomenal training for their agents. And he was talking about how one of the things they train on at Keller Williams is that people think about information and they act on emotion. And I was like, oh right, that's so true. And I can think of so many examples,

00:08:52 like me getting my butt out of the garage and going to the gym. It's not practical, right? Like if you look at it on paper, it takes, it takes longer is the real problem. And so on paper, I kind of want to analyze that and say that doesn't really work for my schedule, but the emotional side of me one,

00:09:11 because I feel like I'm slacking in the garage gym. And that is not how I identify as a CrossFitter. And it's more yeah. Important to me to not be a slacker like that emotional identification, then, you know, the 20 minutes I lose each way. So that's an emotional decision and I've been talking a lot about that, but didn't, you know,

00:09:35 it's great to have some evidence to help me articulate that with my flight group members and my men team members. Yeah. Around selling open space. So a lot of folks are starting to be full on office space. That's happening, right. Nobody's having a hard time selling office, the space, it's the flex space, the dedicated desks that take longer to sell.

00:09:55 And that is more of an emotional buy, right? It's not a need, I don't need flex space. It has to be some sort of emotional driver like me realizing I'm not going to miss my husband while he's in Seattle for two nights, that's a trigger, right? Like, oh, I should, you know, it would be good for my marriage.

00:10:15 If I went to a coworking space, that's emotional. Right. I would maybe like my husband there's been more or appreciate him more or look forward to, you know, talking about my day. If I didn't see him, you know, five times a day when I go to get something to eat or get a coffee or whatever. So what are the emotional triggers that you can pull in order to get people to join it?

00:10:40 Sometimes deals work. One of my members did a BOGO in June and said it worked very, very well for her, which was awesome to hear. But I also think that emotional trigger of I am somebody different in a coworking space, I will show up differently to my work. And how do we see that? We see, we need to see social proof of that.

00:11:05 And quote from your members, testimonials from your members, photos of your members, profiles of your members. Those are all things to be showcasing while you're trying to sell open space. It's not about the price. It's not about the deal. It's about the emotional driver and that doesn't really hold true for offices, but for flex desks, most particularly, and certainly probably some dedicated desks over the dedicated desk,

00:11:33 sort of in the middle. Some people need those need more than one. What are the emotional triggers that you can show in your newsroom? We did newsletter training list, building a newsletter training for our community managers and our community manager university program over the last two months. And we talked about, you know, you always want to have member profiles in your newsletter.

00:11:53 Those are the things that trigger. And if you can, some testimonials, one of our mentees and flight group members did an interview with one of her members and posted it to her blog. It was like jaw dropping. It was so like heartfelt and emotional, the experience that he'd had in that coworking space since he'd started there. And just the transformation that he'd had in terms of how he shows up,

00:12:20 it really was an emotional trigger. And you have to tell those stories. So if you're not getting that done on your own, get someone to help you with that, get you can outsource member profiles and getting those on social media and getting them in your newsletter. Because I think that's really what makes the difference. You know, if you're not. So the woman who went from 38% to 85% occupancy on her offices,

00:12:48 she's being really, really consistent with her marketing efforts. And it can take time. You have to be really, really consistent with those emotional triggers to get people on your newsletter list and on your social media account to finally turn over. And that's what I teach about list building and newsletters, right? Those are not for people who know they want coworking.

00:13:07 Those are for people who haven't decided yet. So put the make sure you're, you're taking the photos, doing the member profiles and putting those up everywhere that you can, particularly in your newsletter because your social media feed, your followers will see 10% of your followers will see what you post. So you gotta be doing that stuff in the newsletter. Anyway,

00:13:28 that was very long intro. I felt like I wanted to share a few things. So if I lost you, come back. Sorry. So this interview today is with Tracy Wilson, who is a really special member of the coworking community. Tracy is awesome and has helped me out a number of times with things that I've needed help with or the GWA.

00:13:53 She is a partner with Pacific workplaces. They have 18 locations in the bay area and growing. I think we confirm that in our interview and cloud VO, which is a lead generator partner for conference rooms and mail and virtual offices, sorry, I shouldn't say mail the rent corrects me all the time on that. Sorry, Laura and co-founder and COO of super and super is an acronym.

00:14:20 Hold on. I gotta find what the acronym is. I don't know if I can find it really quickly. Basically they are the first single use plastic reduction solution and certification for businesses. And they're really focusing on tackling coworking as an opportunity because they know coworking operators tend to care, right? They take care about the member experience. They want to make a difference in the world.

00:14:46 They're, you know, somewhat PR purpose oriented. And so this is in great alignment and already done. She's already run people through the process. So if you're interested in learning more, she's going to share kind of how it works and you know, what the purposes of all of it in our interview. And then the details are in the show notes,

00:15:06 which you can find on the website. It, I think we're episode 209. And I will say, even if you aren't thinking about going through the certification process, I think it's a really interesting conversation for me. It made me think, you know, about my use of plastic in my personal life, certainly in our workspace, our space was in Palo Alto.

00:15:29 And so we already had a very environmentally sensitive group. We, most of our stuff was compostable, but the, the instances of single use plastics is much broader than you would think. And so I found her conversation to be really thought provoking. And that's the whole point of this. It's not to say, you should do this. You need to do this.

00:15:52 You know, we need you to care about plastics, but I think as business owners, it's really important to think about what are the other impacts we want to have? What else can we control in our broader environment? One of our flight group members was recently awarded B Corp status, which is amazing. And it was really important to her to kind of go after that,

00:16:18 to, you know, kind of showcase how their values are aligned with that certification. So there are lots of reasons we might do this. I do think, you know, the future generation of members cares a lot about the environment. So even if it's not top of mind for you, it's somebody to think about in terms of member experience in marketing going forward.

00:16:39 And like I said, Tracy is an OJI in shared office space and she's just a tremendous resource. So reach out to her. If you have questions about our program or about anything in general, I'm volunteering her to be a great resource. Okay. One quick thing. Before we dive in, if you're working on opening a coworking space, I want to invite you to join me for my free masterclass three behind the scenes secrets to opening a coworking space.

00:17:07 If you're starting one, I want to share three decisions that I see successful operators make when they're creating their business. Pre-launch when they're choosing their location and getting ready to open a business, it's totally free. It's about an hour. If you'd like to join us, please register@everythingcoworking.com forward slash masterclass. Okay. And now we are jumping into our interview with Tracy,

00:17:35 Tracy Wilson. Thank you for joining me today. You have an exciting new role, but we'll talk a little bit first about the history that you have in the co-working world. And I am thrilled to get some updates about what you're up to now and how that kind of crisscrosses into the co-working world. So, Tracy, I feel you've done GWA webinars before.

00:18:03 I'm not sure you haven't been on the podcast before though. So first everything could work in podcasts. I think I've had Keithan and Scott's been on and I'm trying to think of Lauren spin on. So Tracy, you are a partner with PAC, which is a regional brand in California and Nevada. And what am I missing? California and Nevada Really? Yeah.

00:18:27 20 low, 20 18, 20 locations, Right? Eight 18. And kind of hopefully soon to be additional as well. I know you guys are always on the move and then also partner with cloud VO, which is a virtual office meeting room partner. I'll let you talk a little bit more about that. And then at the end of 2020, you'd been doing this for a long time and decided time for a change and time to do something that you were passionate about besides workspace and found an opportunity that again,

00:19:03 happened to dovetail back into workspace. So you are now the co-founder and COO of super, is that, is that a, is that the, the end of the, the company named super Well, it's an acronym as, as it happens for single use plastics, elimination or reduction. So at first I thought it sounded a little raw, but then of course,

00:19:26 when you realize it's a very helpful acronym for what we are doing it, it's a, it's a good name, Perfect name. Okay. So tell us, yeah. Tee us up here a little bit about your coworking background and then transition at the end of 2020 and what you're up to now. And then we'll kind of get into the details about what that looks like.

00:19:48 Okay. Yeah. I'm I am one of the, oh geez. In the serviced office industry. Actually my father in fact started executive suites in the seventies, in the San Francisco bay area. So I quite literally grew up anytime I had a break from school, I was, I was in the office doing a little work. How did dad get into this?

00:20:08 Was he an like, was he an attorney or like a user or real estate guy? No, it was, it was kind of by accident. Like there's, there's, you know, a number of these cases where he actually, he used to sell, this is an industry that is long gone business forms. And, you know, we had paper for everything for an branded paper.

00:20:31 You didn't run a business without your forms and triplicate event and things like that. So he had where he sold custom business forms for all sorts of businesses. He and his partner were, had gone off on their own, looking for office space and could only get place. They wanted to be, that was, that was actually space more than they needed.

00:20:53 So they thought what the heck they were going to grow every year, every new business is going to grow and Cancer the business, if you're not overly optimistic. Tracy. Exactly. So, so they took the space and then, well, you know, to kind of help things out and they hadn't, they knew folks that kinda needed space. So they,

00:21:11 they kind of did a few little sublets here and then what the heck they had the staff. So they might as well have the staff kind of help and then, you know, the meeting room and all right, well, we'll share. And next thing you know, we're kind of actually a little bit inundated by people saying, can I get one of those spots in there?

00:21:26 And it, it, it, it actually was complete happenstance that suddenly they were kind of getting well, this kind of, you know, adding on some things and it's, it's leveraging our employees and this is kind of helping us with some costs and is starting to make money. And so they got a little bigger on, on the space needs and they were still doing our business forms,

00:21:47 but so over time it ended up being that the partnership broke down and my, my father just went forward in that, in that new model. And he ultimately had, I mean, a variety of iterations, but five pretty large locations around the San Francisco bay area. And then in fact, one in Sacramento is how I ultimately came to work for him.

00:22:08 Full-time was as a favor, I was kind of transitioning between another job in the nonprofit industry, thinking about going to grad school. And he asked if I could just kind of make a little pit stop, help him out along the way. Since I knew the industry, of course, he trusted me in all that. And so I did, and then it ended up being a really lucky,

00:22:30 delightful experience to have a father daughter team. And so I ended up, my dad started taking longer and longer vacations. I'm not kidding. It was, you know, a month in Europe. And then it was, well, we'll be back in three months. And even then there was before cell phones. And so he just, it was kind of,

00:22:48 you got this, it's like, you know, I'll see ya. So in the, he, he sold out actually in the roll-up of Advantis and which then became religious and the, in the late nineties and he sold and kind of retired except for this one Sacramento location. So I kinda stayed on part-time and ran it until in 2006, I knew them from the industry and they invited me to join them as Lauren,

00:23:13 Dylan and Scott Chambers. And so I joined with them as a partner for what's now Pacific workplaces. So we've been together shockingly 15 years. There's some interesting times, of course, and we've grown down to the 18 and growing locations and, you know, I've had for quite a few years, there's been a little bit, I think PA part of it is by happenstance that I just,

00:23:38 this, you know, it's not a lot of people's careers just sort of happen and that's certainly the case and enjoyable, and I've worked, just have great partners and, and we're, we truly are family, my father to, to the team that is with Pacific we're family, but then a bit of, you know, there's kind of gotta be more.

00:23:57 Yeah. And is there something that there was just something in me that wanted to do something kind of a little bit bigger from a, from a making a bigger kind of D well, it ended up being environment was, is really sort of been a passionate thing. So it's, I've been wringing my hands about particularly plastic pollution and our con our throwaway society and all of these things,

00:24:21 my Berkeley roots, I guess, kind of run deep. And that, in that sense, you know, there's a little bit of hippy in me, I suppose, despite being a business owner and I just, I've kind of fretted it. I'm a parent I'm, you know, my, my step-children have children now. So, you know, I think about the future and,

00:24:38 and what we're all doing in the world. And I will say that COVID just kind of was the thing that I realized the entire world clearly can change in a, in a, almost a minute. And there was an, if not now, when I decided it was time to make a change. So I, at end of 2020, I left my day job in operations with Pacific.

00:25:04 I do a tiny bit of work with them on that kind of backend with Scott Chambers. But other than that, I just decided that I was going to do something and the area of single use plastics reduction of the plastic pollution industry. And I know I told you that point when I left the DWI advisory board that I had, I knew I was aware that I have no work experience in environmental issues and or plastics.

00:25:30 I have no actual education in that either. And somehow I just in my soul or whatever it is inner being new, it was, I was going to, something was going to show up. So I I'm, hopefully I'm not jumping ahead, but I, I ended up deciding that, well, I couldn't fix the past lack of work experience, but I could certainly fix the future education part right away.

00:25:55 So I sign up for a class through UC Berkeley extension and on the circular economy guide to that. And as it happened, my, the professor Manwell Makeda had made a kind of a side comment at one point during one of the webinars about the fact that he had started at the end of 19 20 19, a nonprofit called super again, single use plastics elimination reduction.

00:26:16 And it was a third-party certification program for companies that want to certify their workplaces as either eliminating or greatly reducing the use of single use plastics in their operations and coming up with other alternatives. And oddly, I know work. So I sent a little email after class and said, I'd love to know more for Pacific workplaces in cloud. And perhaps I could share some information and we ended up talking quite a bit and commented while,

00:26:50 you know, kind of bad timing that you launched this for companies to do this. Our workspace is just about the time that everybody sent everyone away from their work spaces, but as it happens, coworking industry still has people in it. I mean, we're, we're operational and we're actually sort of the stop gap for a lot of these people who can't be at home right now.

00:27:09 And so, and in addition, we're a disruptive industry. I mean, we've taken, we've kind of taken real estate and office space as a place. You just go to the place where services is services are done for, for people to be productive. So I thought, what kind of, what better place to launch a pilot? And so I said,

00:27:33 let me, I know, I know a few people in the, in this story and let me think you a pen start moving this forward. I don't know. It feels very much, you know, when I've heard co-working stories and serendipity and all of those terms, we've used these these years, it feels very much like, like that this, this sort of co-working ethos has just manifested itself.

00:27:56 And as much as I wanted to get away, it just it's, it's all, you know, I'm back in a, just in a different way now, just seeing that new vision, just so delighted for the future of what coworking can do to make a difference. And to the, to the environment, frankly, there's, there's so many thousands of us now,

00:28:17 locations, we can make a big difference. And just to mention the ultimate sort of, you know, market for what super is doing is, is can be workplaces, but other forms, you mentioned cruise ships and yeah, The first actual two organizations that men, well, this precedes me landed was the state of Washington, their department, their, their department of commerce next to governor Inslee,

00:28:46 who anybody knows, follows politics at all. He is a very passionate about the environment. And so he wanted to pilot it within his department of commerce. So they, they have contracted with super though, they've asked to put off the implementation till 2022 when they had their employees back in the office, and then the Presidio graduate school in San Francisco signed on as well.

00:29:06 And then we're currently, we're actually in conversations with some big corporations, national park service is a call we have scheduled for next week, actually some airports. And you mentioned yes, a yachting company that is both in Europe and in the United States is considering it there's a market research committee. So all sorts of, of industries. And so coworking, a lot of ways is because of,

00:29:34 of the, as I mentioned, and then disruptiveness and, and the way in which many of us kind of see our businesses, it feels a bit like low-hanging fruit with the way to really create the space and then go from there and, and really build it and get the dots on the map in addition to these other industries. Yeah, No, I,

00:29:54 yeah, I love it. And, you know, you talked at the beginning when we were chatting about, you know, a lot of co-working space owners, just like naturally think of, you know, we're, we're going to do this differently, right? Like things are, and it's, it's, it's a good time to your point in 2020,

00:30:10 we realized right. When you really need to figure out how to do things differently. And I love leveraging that mindset to say, what else in our business can change? You know, what's important to our members. So, yeah. W so what does it mean? What, what's the mission, what's the role? What does it mean to, you know,

00:30:32 be super certified? And I love to like, have you dive into some examples, like plastic water bottles or the easy example, but you gave me one when we were talking like the mints at the front desk, I wouldn't have thought of it, you know, when you're kind of auditing. So yeah. Tell us, like, what does it look like to,

00:30:49 to make this commitment? It's actually quite simple. Ultimately it's an, it's a, an upstream solution to the plastics pollution problems. And what that means is that you don't buy single use plastics. You look for other purchasing alternatives or operational alternatives to replace the use and toss product that you may be just sort of routinely buying without thinking about it at all.

00:31:16 It's intended to be from my view, hospitality play, frankly, where you, and it's, it's a circular economy piece in which it's, it's, hyperlocalized, it's using things for a long period of time. It's keeping things out of the waste streams. So, so and so a downstream would be where you have the stuff, and then you have to figure out what to do with it properly.

00:31:39 This is let's just not buy it. Let's look for all sorts of different ways in which, or other solutions in which to meet all the needs. We need to meet for our clients and members to be productive and healthy and happy. And let's just look for different ways to do it. So water bottles are a great example. There's water and cans.

00:32:00 Now there's box water, there's filtered water systems. There's beautiful, beautiful, big sort of last jars of terrains with lemon or cucumbers or whatever. I'm, I'm always especially a cucumber one. I'm always a fan with w you know, a nice glass next to it. And it's, that's a way to delight your customers and spare our, our earth and our waters and,

00:32:30 and are the living things on our planet. The toxins that are in plastics, which is, which is a chemical product. So the, this the way to do it as we actually, somebody says, they're interested have an assessment. It's basically a question and answer system here, and sorry, I had something pop up and you just go through through it.

00:32:52 It kind of requires somebody with a keen eye who will look around those things like, you know, oh, laminators, do we really need to laminate every Style? I love to laminate Tracey. So totally the longterm lamination and these, the we're closed for Monday, the 4th of July lamination. So, you know, I mean, there's, there's things that are,

00:33:16 I guess your mother doesn't live here above the kitchen. Same as the one that you yeah. But, but yeah, so, you know, really looking around and, and so you identify what you have, what, what are we using here? And then send it in to you, submit it to super, and then we review it and come up with here's what you need to replace or eliminate in order to ultimately become certified.

00:33:44 And it's, it's an iterative process. It's often very regional. They sort of what we try to be helpful and, and product ideas that we've come across just them, but also, you know, again, products aren't available everywhere. So, and it could be that somebody else comes across something that's even better. So it's, it's definitely a wide open ever-changing practice,

00:34:10 which as you just mentioned, I love the idea of just how things are. You're always looking at better ways to do things and to delight your, your members. So you do that. Then you have a period of, you know, 30 to 90 days that you may need in order to make those changes are not terribly difficult. It kind of depends on,

00:34:30 on how quickly you want to move. And then at the point that the company is ready to do this secondary assessment say what they are, and assuming they've met the things that need to be, then we would move to one of the tiered certification levels, which is bronze, which is actually hard to get. I mean, we, we, this is serious.

00:34:48 There's, you know, no point in not having this be where you're not really making a significant change in how you're doing things just to get a bronze certification. So there's bronze, silver, and actually gold is a hundred percent elimination. And in our world of throwaway as a, you know, that's, that's a, that's an Uber commitment to, to the conversation,

00:35:09 not to say you shouldn't shoot for it, but it's definitely, we have very high standards. So that's the process. And then from there it's telling the world and your clients and continuing long-term engagement, we'll send you the, the super certification seal and hope that you announced to the world that your business's commitment to sustainability and then share as it makes sense with your members.

00:35:35 Some may not why they have this beautiful, big thing of, of chilled cucumber water that it's in replace of a plastic bottle. And they're just happy to have it. And that's all good. And others may just be, you know, even an added piece to how much they love the coworking space because of what they're doing to, to delight them.

00:35:58 And it's making a difference too. Yeah. Tracy, I was going to ask kind of what, what type of, sort of mindset, or, you know, sort of framing are you in when you decide to do this? Because at first it will be some extra work I'll have to replace some things I'll have to, you know, maybe make some special communications to my members about,

00:36:19 you know, why and what are we doing? So yeah. How, how do you look at like the ROI of doing this? Well? So a couple of things, one, because in certain parts of the world, like, for example, in fact, on July 3rd and back July, you probably didn't know this, but it's plastic free July.

00:36:39 Oh, perfect timing. That's Oxenfree free. July is a thing. And in fact, on July 3rd, the European union, that, that was the date that the member states of the European union needed to have in place the reduction of a whole list of single use plastic items that the, the European union H the legislation went into effect on July 3rd. So they believe these,

00:37:05 this list of things, water bottles are included are easily replaceable or alternatives are easily available. And so it's, it's legislated not so much here in the United States, but I think probably not paying much attention if you don't realize that there is a conversation around climate change going on, and this is a part of that conversation. And there are a whole lot of consumers who you would probably like to be your members,

00:37:34 who this is something for which they make a conscious decision. And so I think from, for, for a business owner to ignore it completely is a huge mistake. So just from, from that aspect alone, to, to close your sort of doors to those folks that this matters to w would not be a, a longterm business decision and, and my perspective,

00:38:00 and like I said, there may be people who don't actually really care, but they liked the end result. So, you know, you can, you, you don't have to, we certainly don't have to turn anybody off by this process. So that reason, and then as far as ROI, you know, what, one of the things with this pilot project where we're really the Presidio management school did do a project for super to begin with.

00:38:21 And they had some really great examples of, of, if you have a big sort of campus, you know, a Google or an apple, and they, and they get rid of all their plastic color and things, how much they save on just reuse of things and so forth. And it can be quite extraordinary for coworking place. Of course, we are not major consumers.

00:38:41 I mean, collectively when you add us all up, there's a lot here, but we're not major consumers, but we are using the opportunity to start getting some information of specifics, cost savings. At this point, it's really anecdotal. I mean, there's one, I just certified members just recently was telling me about how they used to get treats from,

00:39:02 for all the members. And they come in the plastic, clamshells the pastries and the cookies and so forth. Yeah. And they made an arrangement with a local bakery and the local bakery is more than delighted to deliver the products, deliver them in paper, and which is then, you know, display in a, in a nice way and the location.

00:39:24 And it is verifiably less expensive than the going out to the, the big box to get the products. So you can kind of imagine your members walking into these beautifully, locally baked items that are fresh and have, and have not arrived in a way in which they do any, you know, hundreds of years damage just by, by tossing that plastic I'm thinking way.

00:39:48 So anecdotally, you know, there, as far as our costs are the pilot for coworking location specifically, it's just for coworking where we're charging $99 for the onboarding and the assessment and the review. And then the first year certification should, should they meet that level is $50. So to the extent that $149 is something that just the process alone and engaging in,

00:40:16 you know, what you're using and what other alternatives might be there. And working with the super team on, on options, I will say, so myself, I think that's worth every bit of $49. So, so if that kind of answers the question where we are, did some of it's to be determined as we go forward. Yeah. Well,

00:40:37 I'm also thinking, I mean, in terms of ROI, because there's just a lot of benefits around, you know, to your point thinking about, oh, we just do this because it's how we've always done it. Like, well, we always get croissants and pastries and these plastic shells, and maybe there's a better outcome for everyone, you know,

00:40:55 for you, the business, your members appreciate it, the water, I am such a sucker for the hotel lobby or the we work, you know? Right. And we never did it probably because it was too much work, but if it was about the member experience and it was about a bigger, you know, means to an end, then I think you just look at it differently.

00:41:19 And I can only imagine what our members would have thought if we had fruit and views water in this Space Sacramento, we just find necessity because it gets so hot here that our filtered water system starts to, it can't keep up sometimes. So we would actually ha we would fill up those just to have that extra. And we, we do lemonade and water and you just,

00:41:44 you know, I mean, you just do, and I'm not talking about fresh squeezed lemonade. Yeah. Yeah. So it's actually, frankly, easier than the people who are decidedly upset. Cause they, even the filtered system on the really hot days, can't keep up to need to Feel. But a lot of them, I bet Houston has that problem.

00:42:03 I bet. And then I'm thinking of, you know, also to your point, there are, it's probably a bit regional, but members who they love that they can sort of align their values with someone. And it's a way to differentiate, right? If you're in a market that has kind of a lot going on, it's a talking point for your marketing for members.

00:42:24 I also think, you know, potentially a talking point for recruiting, you know, how, how difficult it's getting to recruit great talent for coworking spaces. I was talking to another operator earlier and he was saying, how recruiting is getting more challenging? And I said, you know, I just had to drop something off at the FedEx. The FedEx is,

00:42:44 is paying, signing bonuses to get, to get like the FedEx, like just the, the physical location, you know, not a driver, but just the physical location. And when your values align, you know, and our community managers who, you know, might be younger and they care about the environment and it's one of their values, you know,

00:43:03 when you can align with that, it can be a talking point that might, you know, on the margin, help attract good people who, you know, you most are more purpose aligned. I think it's a meaningful role anyway, but when you can align some of those other things, I think it can, it might help. Yeah. I mean,

00:43:21 I was one of the things I'm doing coffee and tea products are a big sort of area of struggle. And this weekend I actually was working with a very local organic coffee roaster working on a arrangement for them to, to give re, to bring reusable containers of, of ground coffee to our locations. I was, I was meeting with the team there and certainly a lot younger or older than them,

00:43:48 but so they're not trying to be too Smith they're young. And when I was telling him what I was trying to do, they were, they were so wonderful. They were so excited about actually the marketing opportunities of being in our space and the synergies there, they are ready to deliver them to all of our locations and make it work, how it needs to work.

00:44:13 And the truth of the matter is our wholesale price of their organic locally roasted coffee is within a very small margin of what it is to just get the standard packaged coffee. And so when you consider even the, the delivery and all of that, and then the marketing and the, just the conversation on the tour of the special, you know, locally roasted coffee that we're providing all day long.

00:44:42 I mean, it, it's an easy argument. That's just a great option. Tracy. I feel like when we first talked about this, you've mentioned like, you know, oh, you might have some members like attorneys, who will, I really, I want watered bottle, bottled water for my clients when they come in, how do you reframe some of those?

00:45:03 No, I have. And I will tell you having the conversation has ultimately never been a problem. And you know, I'll talk about the fact that, well, as a business owner, it is ultimately a decision that I've made that this is important and there's people don't generally say, oh, you know, I really choose to, you know, pollute plastics.

00:45:29 So right away people say I get it. But you know, I like having this. So when I say, look, this is a great, you know, we will certainly bring in a water service and coffee service into the meeting room. If you'd like, we do, we do upcharge for that. And so we will do that. Or the delightful thing for you is people need breaks and long meetings and depositions,

00:45:53 and they want to be actually invited and made to feel welcome at your law firm, which your is in our space. So we want you to bring them into the kitchen. We want you to invite them to, to partake of anything that we have as your slash our guests here at this space, they can take their breaks and go get free refreshers.

00:46:11 They can fill up the coffee, whatever accoutrements they want with it. And, you know, the idea is just to make it a more enjoyable experience. And I have always had when I have couched it that way of, oh yeah. I liked that. Oh, you're sort of suggesting a level of hospitality that they might have with their clients that just as better for everyone.

00:46:32 Right. And I think they're kind of saying, well, there's a hospitality and giving somebody their own individualized model. And I'm saying, let's up our game here. Let's make it a whole experience of inviting them. And so, so that's really what it's about. Yeah. It's about thinking about it differently, which is a theme that, you know,

00:46:51 you talked about at the beginning. So what are some other sort of common single use plastics that are found in co-working spaces that we may or may not realize we're using? Well, Certainly, you know, the big cutlery, the, the coffee stirs, any, any cups or dishes, a lot of stuff. When you have community events and you want to hold,

00:47:14 you want to make it fun. So you go to the dollar store and buy 50 plastic lays, as opposed to maybe coming up with some other, maybe have making a fun experience in using natural flowers or cutting out colored paper or any number of things that could be fun and creative, and even, you know, bring some of the members in on,

00:47:32 on some little crafty projects. Somebody may love that. And maybe their outlet to just give them potlucks and things like that. Having some rules around community events, that's a good area of, of just starting to look for and say what you kind of are expecting within your space and making some different decisions there, you know, things that I'm looking at,

00:47:53 oh, soaps and detergents, it's so much fun to realize that there's bar soap for washing your dishes. You can get these, you know, really cool. So my bottle of method or whatever is considered a single use plastic. Well, So the, you know, they ultimately that would be better to replace it, but then the other option would be to get a really big bottle of something and at least a refill.

00:48:18 And so that would be the thing, but yes, if you're getting a small bottle and using a tossing, it's single use, but there's so many, again, there's so many things out there when you open your eyes and start looking at the things, and then the beautiful thing. Again, you get to have this opportunity to have a conversation with your client in just a sharing way.

00:48:36 Hey, we're really innovative here. Again, this is not, this is not about preaching, telling them ready. Don't use plastics. It's about the ideas and innovation and other ways to do things and showing somebody. And I think a lot of times people do want to do things differently for the world, but they don't know how it's not easy. And when suddenly they have an alternative place in front of them,

00:49:02 they see it in use and they think, gosh, it's not big deal. And they start using that home. They might really appreciate that. And so that's, you know, that's so soaps, cleaners, those kinds of things. And then there's some of the harder stuff tape the envelopes that are, you know, there's, there's a lot, there's a lot,

00:49:20 there's the individually wrapped mints. And, you know, we need to find other ways to, we talked about the individual creamers. Okay. So do you have a solution? This comes up in my groups all the time and maybe, maybe you're going to say, take a break. I'm thinking meeting service. You want people to have coffee service in the boardroom,

00:49:42 but if we can't use the single serve creamers, everyone has the hardest time keeping creamers cold enough in the thermos. But do you have to eat to put the thermos on ice? No. You depends on how long the meeting is. Well Sure, but you, if you have thermostats in the fridge, fill them up. I mean, we have such great thermostat.

00:50:02 I mean, my Hydroflask keep the water cold till tomorrow. And so there's so much good technology and reusable. And sometimes I think it's just me. I'm not saying put a Hydroflask of creamer out there, but interesting talking, you know, I don't know. Maybe you could or should, but there's a lot of you can definitely better Technology. Yep.

00:50:26 And you just have to be willing to invest in it. I think that's part of it. Cause some of those serious thermoses are expensive. So now you have to do the creamer and the Oak milk and the soy milk and milk. Yeah. I have to do all those. You can. I mean, definitely dairy is probably good. And then a lot of times we'll do you know,

00:50:43 it depends on the location. We'll do maybe one other, sometimes two, depending on how busy, just as a courtesy for those people, that dairy is not helpful to them or something that they don't like. And it's, it's not, it's not a big, it's not a heavy lift to get some, How about garbage bags? Is there a work around for you That you want to do?

00:51:06 You know, Mara, she opened my eyes to the idea that every desk doesn't have to have a trash can for goodness, Oh, all the trash cans. I would also be in the camp of right. We had trash cans everywhere in this space because God forbid somebody have to walk around to throw away their trash. How's her. I mean, I was just like,

00:51:25 whoa, mind blown. When she said you have kind of four people working in here, they do not need to have four trash cans and they can have one or two and they can, they can walk four feet and put something in. The other thing is, you know, to have some, some, some rules, I guess when you onboard people about not the food and beverage or you have beverages that are still full,

00:51:48 really shouldn't go in your, in your desk trash anyway. Please take them to the kitchen area. And, and frankly there's a real cost savings and it's not huge. I'm most janitorial companies do reuse the bags to the extent they can. So if it's just some paper that's in there, they generally dump it into a bigger plastic thing. And then they leave that.

00:52:13 And of course I'm for that all day long and they can't do it when it's food waste and things like that. So that would be why you would say that. And then frankly, in a lot of cases, it doesn't need to, everything doesn't need to be changed every day, either a three-day a week cleaning of, of offices. And so to the extent that you could save some money,

00:52:35 talk about ROI and then you just it's about expectation. And this is when it's done. And this is kind of how we do things and not stuff. If it's, if it's handled properly, can save cost savings for the, for the coworking location, as well as something that just really does not bother members. Let's just say, so what about The inbound plastic ware from ordering DoorDash?

00:53:01 Well, so how, you know, it would be nice if like in California there was some legislation pending that I thought pending or may have anyway. I don't know where it is. SFO, for example is compo. You have to compost. Well, there's more than just actually, it's amazing that we'd have to have this, but where are these?

00:53:20 The restaurants would have to ask, do you want them before they put them in the bag? Which think they do just because the money too, every time you say no, that's Okay. Exactly. I feel like whenever somebody orders lunch, all of a sudden there are 25 plastic forks. Why? Right. Yeah. Right. So it's two things.

00:53:36 It's the certification is for the co-working company, not the members. So somebody brings in their Starbucks, there there's no police, you know, that's their choice. It'd be nice that, you know, around the office, there's a conversation and they start looking at things differently, but they want is if you place orders, you start learning. And it's hard to remember even.

00:54:01 Cause we're so used to just things happening. And to us is saying, I do not want this sent, you know, when they go to hand you a straw and you say, I don't need one. So it's just a matter of starting to, to say what you want and that way as the customer in that case. But none of it's,

00:54:22 none of the certification is an obligation attached to the members. So that's when that's a thing. So yeah. So it's just, it's just the decisions. What about, and maybe knowing your membership and knowing, you know, I welcome any nudge around behavior. That's helpful that I may just not be thinking about on my own, you know, most people,

00:54:48 yeah. I think most people do. I mean, I think there's a little bit of like, okay, we don't know, you know, big brother, the members, but I welcomed being a part of a space that's acting really responsibly and can demonstrate and help me think about how to be more thoughtful. So I hate to ever big brother and I'm just,

00:55:08 you know, there's just in everything we do. There's so many areas in which we could big brother, our members around all sorts of behaviors in our, in our shares and the, and the truck to being a really good operator is to learn how to, to not do that yet. Subtly do that. Yeah. You may have Members that have solutions to Felicia who runs habe Haven.

00:55:37 She has a member that does maybe it's water filters for single use or for reusable water bottles. Oh, okay. It's something that a member D and she's like, that's what we use, you know, it's yeah. I'm probably getting it a little bit wrong. I'll have to ask her to clarify and I'll put a link to it in the show notes.

00:55:56 You're in upstate New York on well water. You could just fill up your bottle with a little, your own Good point. I could take that. And I would probably, yes. I was telling Tracy how my parents have a well, and the water is, it's like, sulfury, there's something about right. The water that's available. So it's challenging to use fresh water at my parents' house in that.

00:56:18 Yes. I'll have to ask Felicia for that. I'll send a case the next time I visit. I know. So, But I know you're running out of time and you've got to tell us How to yeah. So I know there's some co-working space operators that we won't share names, but who are jumping right in because it aligns with their core mission.

00:56:37 So yeah, if you, if you, if we want to learn more, where do we go? We'll, we'll put all the details in the show notes. So easiest. And it's easy to remember as we talked about the name at the beginning, you something super, how do you not now, you're just going to say it all the time because it's,

00:56:53 everything's just super, but www super.ngo is our website. And my email is tracy@super.ngo. As we mentioned, I'm with Pacific workplaces and cloud VO. So Tracy at either of those names and you will get me all ways to center. And if you mentioned that you want to know more about it as, as I, I know you've, we've talked previously,

00:57:22 I get really jazzed about this conversation. So any opportunity is delightful for me. So I am. If, if you feel that it would be good for you to make me happy to have the conversation wherever I can. So you Don't hesitate to reach out, we'll portrays these contacted, go in the show notes. And if you get her on the line,

00:57:43 also, you can ask her any question about coworking because she, as we said, it is, it's a total OJI and Pacific, you know, I was talking about our mentor program. I was like, Tracy, you know, the mentor program that we run is for all the folks that want to operate like a Pacific, because you guys, I mean,

00:58:00 you've been doing this for a while. You've got it down. You've run really, really wonderful communities. But also from our business perspective, you have just, you have all the right systems in place and you're, you know, you guys run like a well-oiled machine. So if you get Tracy on the line, ask her anything, that's my offer.

00:58:21 Well, you go, I, the one thing I'm we talked about this briefly, and if it fits into this conversation, you can. So I mentioned that I started this mission by taking a circular economy class, and one of the worst things that absolutely just made me so excited is the fact that this circular economy just quickly, as you know, we operate in what's turn the linear economy,

00:58:43 which is we take resource from the earth. We make things from it and then we use them and then we throw them away. And then you repeat, so buy, buy, buy, repeat, repeat, repeat. Obviously we're running out of resources. We're running out of all sorts of things to do that. The earth can not sustain this. So circular economy is a way to,

00:58:59 to take things, make resources, and then reuse, repurpose remanufacturer re and keep in the economy as long as possible. And ideally at the end of the life, the, the waste actually becomes a resource for something else or the planet. So that's a circular economy keeping going. And the coolest thing for me, cause I was kind of on a down COVID was a painful year,

00:59:21 leaving the operations at the end of 2020 and realizing, and being energized that, that the coworking industry is a circular economy industry. And it is, I, I just really want us to start everywhere. We can marketing the fact that we, we built there's so many, I mean, I've been doing this a long time. There's Regis is all over Pacific's we've been using with small modifications,

00:59:47 the same infrastructure for 15, 16 years with, you know, updates. But when you think about the tragedy of retenanting and, and all of the throwaways of furniture and other resources that just get used for short periods of time, and then just dump, we are such an important industry to sustainability. And I really, really want us to start having that as a part of the conversation around coworking as something that we just do by virtue of our business model that matters.

01:00:23 And it's exciting. And however anybody wants to spend on, I just had to sort of say it and leave it there because it, it makes me so energized. It's it's just fantastic. And it, and it kind of, it's one more thing that's circular circular brings me back to my love of this industry. So I just had to perfect The perfect ending.

01:00:43 Okay. Tracy, we will put all of your contact info into the show notes. So anybody who's interested can reach out and thank you for bringing this to our attention. I, you know, I feel like this is one of those things. Like we, it, it, it's an opportunity. And even if folks don't reach out, it's an opportunity to just think differently about what we're doing in our space and,

01:01:05 you know, changes that we might enact. So thank you for taking the time Upwards and onwards when you kind of have that vision of it. Yeah. Yeah. And kind of anything's possible in that way. So. All right. Well, thanks, Jamie. It's always so delightful to talk to you. Even my first. This is actually not just my everything.

01:01:23 Coworking first podcast is my full Virgin co variance. Well, I suspect you're going to be on the circuit now. Thank you, DC.

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