325. OG Scott Tillitt on Small-Town Coworking and Leveraging Coworking Ambassadors and Part-Time Community Activators
Resources Mentioned in this Episode:
Everything Coworking Featured Resources:
Masterclass: 3 Behind-the-Scenes Secrets to Opening a Coworking Space
TRANSCRIPTION
325. OG Scott Tillitt on Small-Town Coworking and Leveraging Coworking Ambassadors and Part-Time Community Activators
00:00:00,"Welcome to the Everything Coworking podcast, where every week I keep you updated on the latest trends and how tos in Coworking. I owned and operated Coworking spaces for eight years and then served as the executive director of the Global Workspace Association for five years. And today I work with hundreds of operators and community managers every month, allowing me to bring you a thought provoking operator,"
00:00:26,"case studies and inspirational interviews with industry thought leaders to help you confidently stay on top of what's important and what you can apply to your own role in the Coworking industry. Welcome to the Everything Coworking Podcast. This is your host, Jamie Russo. Thank you for joining me. Okay, lots going on. WeWork bankruptcy, I realized I haven't officially sort of covered that on the podcast,"
00:00:57,"but if you need it covered, there's a lot happening on LinkedIn. I did post on LinkedIn and maybe I'll throw that in the Facebook group as well or send it in an email. My kind of view on the fact that I, there's certainly some, you know, good news, bad news for independent operators as this comes through. It is pretty significant for some asset holders."
00:01:25,"Geo and I worked with a landlord on that has a WeWork in their building to try to figure out what is their strategy. I don't think they are gonna have their lease rejected, but you know, there's still a question of what does that look like? You know, how distracted is the company, you know, our incentives aligned, all those things."
00:01:43,"They're trying to figure out what that means for them. And you know, they're real people who happen to be in the business of owning assets, but they own a lot of commercial property in a market that is struggling right now. So it is certainly challenging for the landlords in this case, but there are lots of thriving markets, lots of thriving Coworking spaces."
00:02:04,"And if you didn't hear my episode on WeWork Few, it was a few episodes ago up, basically talked about WeWork's growth strategy is unlike the typical operator in that they were focused purely on growth and not in profitable sort of unit economics. So that's, it's not always the case that an independent operator won't, you know, invest and be in the red in order to expand."
00:02:30,"It is challenging to, to expand using cashflow. I talk with a lot of operators about expansion strategies and how to approach that and they, you know, always want there to be some sort of simple way to do that. And it's just, it's, it is hard, you know, going from a couple locations even to that five location level. So there certainly is some investment,"
00:02:51,"some, you know, investment that it takes to scale. But the, I, you know, the, the eyeballs are usually on getting each unit profitable over time. And again, a significant growth may mean that is not the case. You've got a lot of overhead, you've got a lot of expenses that you know aren't covered by revenue at the individual locations during growth."
00:03:22,"And sometimes that's a strategy for high growth companies, but probably not for most of you who are listening. So hopefully you are doing well and are profitable. And if you are trying to figure out kind of where you fit into the marketplace, I wanna invite you to join our operator membership. We call it the Everything Coworking Academy. And I don't talk about it very often,"
00:03:43,"mostly because I'm always talking about the Startup School and the Community Manager University. But we have this amazing group of operators. We meet once a month, we talk on Slack, we do some expert trainings and resources throughout the month as well. And it's just a great group of folks to sort of, you know, benchmark and run. You know, we look at layouts,"
00:04:07,"we talk about hiring, we talk about all the things that, you know, owners are going through and some are owner operators and some have multiple locations. There's kind of a range. We had our November call a couple weeks ago and I just love that group. I think they love each other. We have folks who've been in that group forever. Partly the group exists for Startup school students who are like,"
00:04:29,"you know, I love the, the community that I've built. I don't wanna be done. So we kind of funnel into that and then we opened up the group kind of more formally probably like a year and a half ago. So anyway, if you're thinking, you know what, for 2024, I want to get, you know, more formally involved in a group that's talking about business strategy and even just kind of the day-to-day of running a Coworking business."
00:04:51,"I will put the link in the show notes. It's called the Everything Coworking Academy. You can also find it on our website. It's under a link called Membership for Operators that are already launched. I think because all of our, there's we've lots of names for all of our programs. Anyway, what else is happening? We're getting ready for a big trip just on a personal note."
00:05:13,"And I have that, like I cannot get everything done feeling, and my husband and I had had that conversation last night. He's like, well there's just, there's just no room that's not happening. I don't know how this is gonna get done. He's leaving town on Monday and then my daughter and I, he's going to a conference in London that he goes to every year."
00:05:33,"And last year I said, I feel like we should come next year. You already have a plane ticket paid for. We're sitting on a pile of hotel points from, you know, business credit cards and whatnot that we didn't, haven't used in so long because of the pandemic. And we just haven't done overseas trips in a long time. So we're,"
00:05:52,"I'm super excited we're going to London and Rome. So my daughter and I are flying next week, which could be any, which could have happened already by the time you listened to it. But we're mostly gonna be there over us Thanksgiving, which will be nice. And we're missing kind of the craziness of traveling. And we don't usually see family over Thanksgiving 'cause I refuse to get on a plane during this super busy time."
00:06:13,"Sometimes we'll sort of arbitrage and go the weekend before. But anyway, I am happy to enjoy London and Rome food versus eating a Turkey. I don't even eat Turkey. So anyway, looking forward to it. I am hoping I can sneak in like an afternoon. I'm like whispering so my husband doesn't hear me. I was thinking about this in my run this morning."
00:06:35,"I'm like, how am I going to swing this? I think if I did an afternoon of, of space tours, I might be able to squeeze that in. So we don't have a lot of time in either cities. So it'll be mostly family time, which is important. What else is going on? We're super busy. We've been doing 2024 planning."
00:06:54,"We're planning out our Community Manager training schedule. We just onboarded a bunch of new community managers from, from a large operator. We're super excited. They have decided that this is a professional role and they really want their community managers to go through formal training when they joined. So they put a cohort into the group. We love that group. We're looking at,"
00:07:17,"you know, all the ways we can support them through 2024. So that's happening. I did find it very challenging. My 2024 planning is still not done yet. I blocked off a few days and then those days got very interrupted. I think next year I have to like send an email to key people in my business life and say, I, you know,"
00:07:39,"I'm, I'm off site for three days. I'm not answering your texts, I'm not answering your emails. I push it to put it out an office on. So it was a bit mixed. So I'm learning, but I got some of it done. Some of it done. I'd love to hear how you guys do your 2024 planning. Sometimes we host a workshop for our members and we haven't done that this year,"
00:08:00,"so we'll see. Maybe we'll still consider it working on some projects for landlords. We're looking at a lot of test fits, a lot of proformas. We just did our proforma session for our Coworking Startup School cohort. A great mix of folks in that group. Building owners, folks that want to do childcare, which we're trying to help them figure out one woman in Mexico,"
00:08:25,"I'm like, I'm sorry, your rent is what? So trying to get everybody, you know, good with their numbers. We're doing phase one, which is floor plans or you know, estimated floor plans since they don't have their specific spaces picked out yet. And product mix and proforma. And Kim Lee is our coach in that program. So she and I like to share the proforma session and see who can get a proforma done in class."
00:08:54,"So just lots going on, which, which we love. So yeah, soccer season finally is over, which is great. Lots of refereeing. I was refereeing like five or six games a day during our tournament. So this weekend is prep for the trip. Okay, so I hope you guys are having a good kind of pre-holiday season. Speaking of holidays,"
00:09:18,"we, for our Community Manager group this month we talked about how to manage the holidays in a Coworking space. And the Community Manager seemed pretty on top of it, but we gave out a resource of things to think about because it can be complicated depending on kinda where you're located. You might have a wide variety of members who have different backgrounds, different religions,"
00:09:40,"different preferences on, you know, how they like to handle holidays in a workplace. So we're helping them kind of think through that 'cause those are coming up right away. We also delivered some really great member appreciation event ideas. 'cause it's always good to have fresh ideas to work from. Okay, let's talk about today's guest. So today's guest is the founder of Beahive Coworking Scott Tillitt."
00:10:07,"So I did not know Scott, I found him through the Facebook group and he has been open since 2009. And we talked about this on the podcast so I won't go into it too long. But that was early days. That was like when there was a Google group, but not a lot of other resources. A very passionate Google group. And some of those folks are still around,"
00:10:28,"which is awesome. But he had to figure out a lot of things on his own and it was really fun to hear his story. He's experimented with multiple locations. He is learned a lot through different types of partnerships. He was like without sort of knowing it, doing management agreement deals, but smaller locations and smaller communities. He's super community focused, very,"
00:10:52,"you'll hear his story and kind of his why and many of you're gonna really, you know, relate to his why. And so his, his he, you know, essentially is now committed to the business full-time, but had been doing a lot of different businesses and not-for-profit work and community support work. So he has, not all of his spaces are staffed full-time."
00:11:16,"He would if if they are it's by him. So, so one of the reasons I'd reached out to him was to talk about his ambassador program. And if you look at his website, we'll link that up in the show notes. You can see he has some ambassadors and he doesn't use them as heavily as some others do. He's got, you know,"
00:11:36,"one or two that are committed to a couple of shifts each week. And then he is got a community activator who actually works full time but works remotely and sort of, you know, sort of side hustles for the space. She was a member, which is very cool. So this is, so he spends a lot of his time, but also he's really created this culture that understands how to operate professionally without leaving all their dishes all over the place and whatnot without,"
00:12:03,"you know, intense oversight. And you know, he's in a particular market like his Beacon New York location. He said there are six coffee shops on Main Street, which is where they're located. So it's like I don't have to worry that much about coffee. They do try to be there to greet meeting room users who are not members. 'cause we were talking about that in our Community Manager group we have,"
00:12:24,"that was a big discussion on one of our best practice calls was, okay, how do we, if we're not fully staffed all the time, how do we manage that workflow, that user experience to help non-members get in and use our meeting spaces and not be frustrated or confused? It can be challenging 'cause people don't like to read stuff. So anyway,"
00:12:46,"Scott kind of talks through how they approach that and we're having a lot of those conversations on our membership calls too. So if that's something you're trying to figure out, come join us certainly. But you'll love hearing Scott's story, his background, the things he's experimented with. He's in PR and communications, which I love. I if I had another half hour,"
00:13:08,"I would've asked him a lot more about sort of how he uses that part of his brain for his Coworking business. So we might have to have him back on again, but we use it our full hour. This is kind of a longer episode, but he has a great story and I think you're gonna really enjoy hearing his perspective and some learnings from how he is operating his spaces."
00:13:27,"So without further ado, here is Scott Tillitt. Hello. I am sitting here with Scott Tillitt, who I have never met before, but I saw him post to our Facebook group and I sort of stalked him and was like, Scott, we need to talk about your Coworking story and your ambassador program. So Scott, I don't know anything about your story and I can't wait to hear it."
00:13:52,"Thank you for joining me. Thanks for having me. Okay. I was googling where you are. So one of your locations is in Beacon, New York, which, how far from the city are you from Me, I've got an hour, actually. We're an hour 20 to Grand Central. We're on Regional Rail, the metro north. Oh Wow. Perfect."
00:14:10,"Yeah, You're straight up the river. We're actually on the, on the Hudson. Are you where everybody wanted to live after the pandemic? Yes. Yeah. So, And and I mean we were, before we started this Oh You already were and now, right? Yeah. But but you know, we, we were talking real estate prices 'cause you were out in just outside of San Francisco."
00:14:30,"I mean, you know, real estate and Beacon has increased a lot in the, I've been here now 17 years. It's increased a lot in the 17 years because, I mean, this is pre pandemic thing. The Hudson we're in the Hudson Valley, which you've probably heard of. It's, it's very hot area and it's been that way for quite a while."
00:14:49,"And Beacon in particular, a world famous art museum opened here just before I moved here, but maybe net 19 years ago or so. And we're on the train line, you know, an hour 20 to Grand Central. So it's a, it's just, it's one of those really hot areas, you know, an hour outside of the city where everyone has escaped to."
00:15:07,"Right, Right. And Eve to your point, even before the pandemic wanted to escape too. Yeah. So I grew up between Binghamton and Syracuse And Oh, way up there. Be like, Yeah, exactly. They'd be like, oh, upstate New York. I'd be like, well, way upstate, Upstate. Not like what you're picturing Right. Train line,"
00:15:23,"you know Right. Farmland. I was like, no, I'm keep going. A few hours Used to be there was a T-shirt store in town and they had a shirt with, with New York state on it and then a, a star or something where Beacon is and it said, does this look like upstate to you? That's funny. When you, like Beacon is pretty far down when you look at All,"
00:15:46,"it's pretty far down York. You look at the back York state is big. Yeah. But still your population is 13,000 and it looks like a adorable small town. So It's a very adorable small town with a very vibrant main street. In fact, it's one of the longest main streets in the country. It's just over a mile long. You just don't have main streets that are like this,"
00:16:08,"that are, you know, downtown areas are blocks and they're, you know, they're whatever. But, and it's actually called Main Street and it is the spine of the city. And that's where we started 14 years ago. 14 plus years ago. I Know, right? So 2009 was like before Coworking was on the internet. Before Was on the internet,"
00:16:28,"Yeah. Be before 2009. 'cause I opened in Chicago at the very beginning of 2012. So I was doing all my research in 2011. Like there wasn't like how to start a Coworking space on the internet. You were making it up. Oh, I see what you mean. Yeah. There, there weren't resources. Well, you know, there was a Google group,"
00:16:45,"the Coworking Google group. Sure. You know, there were a few, there were, yeah, there were a few kind of pioneers who were sharing tons. It, it really was a movement. Then Alex Hillman, who I've met a number of times, Tony bpo, who's been to MySpace a couple of times. Oh nice. Yeah. Yeah."
00:17:04,"Jerome started in 2010. Jerome. Jerome. So pretty early. Yep. Yep. Yeah, I'm just Sure just saying though, there was like a sprinkling and you had to know how to find single Group there. You had to know. Yeah. Had to know where to look in the, in the recesses of the, of the internet for sure."
00:17:21,"Hey, I am interrupting this episode for any of you that are thinking about, or are already working on starting a Coworking space, which would be 2024 at this point, if you're just getting started, I wanna make sure you know, we have updated the format of our Coworking Startup School. We are now running it live. Although you don't have to attend live."
00:17:45,"You can get all the content and resources and the roadmap without attending live. But we think that is the absolute best way to get the support that you need and build your own Coworking community as you're getting started. So we've split the Coworking Startup School into two phases. And we've been running phase one, which we call validate your plan. And we really,"
00:18:12,"really want folks to clearly know their numbers before they commit to a lease. We even have folks that already own buildings that are going through phase one to make sure they get everything right before they actually commit to their layouts and start construction. So phase one is really around knowing who your target customer is, making sure you have the right size of space that aligns with your goals,"
00:18:40,"and then figuring out your product mix, your floor plan and your pricing, and then putting that all together so that you have a pro forma that you can take to the bank, as they say literally and figuratively. We also have pitch deck and business plan templates, and we run these workshops live. So you're actually, we have prep work that you're doing offline as homework."
00:19:06,"We try to keep that pretty reasonable. We want you to be able to complete this work and make a go no go decision. And if you have draft floor plans and things that you're trying to like finalize and take to contractors or get plans approved on, we want you to be able to do that pretty quickly. So we run this across five weeks,"
00:19:23,"which gives you a little bit of time to catch up on your homework. And we run live sessions with live coaches so that we can get your questions answered and walk you through as we go. But you're work shopping, you're doing the work on the calls, unless you've already done some of the work and then you're getting feedback on that work on the calls."
00:19:43,"Again, you don't have to come live, but we've designed it so that you get expert support and again, you meet others who are going through the same process and we do it pretty quickly. So phase one, validate your Model is running our next session. We have scheduled to start at the very beginning of January, and that's a ways away if you're listening to this when we just launch it."
00:20:07,"So you can register anytime and get the content immediately so you can start working on it. If we have enough folks register, we will move up the live date. So we like to have a little cohort that we can run through the pl through the program. So if we get folks who are registering, then we can move up the date of the start of the first live session."
00:20:30,"We've set it for the second week in January. So to get more details on that, go to everything co Everything Coworking dot com slash start. Now back to our episode. Okay. So how, how did you end up in, so you live in Beacon? I do. Okay. So, so the, I guess the story kind of begins in 2006 I was living in Brooklyn."
00:21:01,"Okay. And I joined a, I joined a writer space in Manhattan near Union Square called Paragraph, which was essentially a Coworking space for writers, although, I don't know if I knew the term, they didn't use Coworking, use the Term term. Yeah. And you know, according to Laura it was, you know, started in 2005 and by Brad Newberg in Yeah."
00:21:21,"San Francisco. So we really, it, you know, less than a year before. So anyway, I joined that writer space and I had been working for myself at that point for about five years or so. And I worked from coffee shops, you know, bouncing around lower Manhattan and Brooklyn and whatever. So I was primed for co-working, even if I didn't know that it existed."
00:21:47,"So I joined this writer space and then I was a member just for a short time because then I moved to Beacon, you know, an hour north. Okay. And there obviously was nothing like that in Beacon. And after a couple Of, and you were a writer, what was the work you were doing? Well, I was a writer, but primarily I was a PR and communications consultant."
00:22:04,"And this actually ties into why I started Beahive, but I was writing for a magazine about completely unrelated stuff, photography, but, but I was primarily PR and communications. You know, I did some of that work at paragraph two and, and working in social impact, so nonprofits and foundations and books and films of the message. You know, I promoted several of the Dalal Lama's visits."
00:22:27,"I promoted an anti-war documentary that Phil Donahue produced. So I was in that world, environmental stuff, social justice, et cetera. And when I moved to Beacon, I really fell in love with the community in Beacon. You population's about 15,000 depending on where you look, but so it's a small community. As I said, it's a very vibrant main street."
00:22:48,"And at the time, in 2006 when I moved, you know, it was a handful of folks who moved up from Brooklyn. So it was a small, tight-knit sort of expat like city expats. Right? Yeah. What, what Prompted you to move? Did you need a break from the city? Like What? Yeah, well I, my then wife was tired of the city and she had discovered Beacon."
00:23:08,"Okay. And, you know, I mentioned the, the art museum Dia had opened just a couple years ago. So there was a lot of buzz around. I mean, there was buzz around it, certainly within the art world and real estate speculators, right? Yeah. And so, so I was actually, I was looking for, there are two things."
00:23:26,"One, I'd worked for myself. So, you know, I started Beahive for my own, for myself as a space to be, you know, as a Coworking space. 'cause yeah, I wanted that. But also I was looking for a way to kind of translate this social justice, progressive issue oriented work I was doing to something that was more sort of concrete and localized and community focused."
00:23:49,"Because, you know, that anti-war documentary, I mean, we didn't stop the war with that, you know, I got butts in seats, I got people to go see it, the Dalal lama, like he's getting his message of, you know, his nebulous message of world peace out, whether I'm working with him or not. So I wanted something that was a little more kind of concrete."
00:24:08,"And so I saw Beahive as a way of addressing my own personal, you know, work-related stuff and, and need for community around work. And also as a way to kind of be a platform for community engagement. And so Coworking was the business model and a means to an end, but it was much deeper than that. It was, as I said,"
00:24:31,"a platform for community engagement. And that's manifested in a lot of ways over the years. So that's how it started. And that was early 2009. You know, I started small 700 and some square feet, one room, and I eventually expanded in that building over the years. And then just five months ago we relocated from that space down the street into a larger,"
00:24:55,"you know, gut renovated space. Wow, Okay. So how did you know you'd, I guess you'd seen paragraph, like, was that your model or did you find, what, so what was the, like you're like, I need, you've sort of had this thing, thing you wanted to solve. Yeah, I think I had, okay,"
00:25:14,"I'm gonna go sign a lease and do, you know, do this? Like, what was that? Well, Yeah, I mean, as you said, there wasn't a lot of information out there, but part of my progressive work and revolved around localism and localism, if you don't know what localism really is by local, is like a small part of it."
00:25:34,"It's a, it's a kind of, it's a community development slash economic development kind of paradigm that was really nascent at the time. And I was following that because I was just interested in, again, like community and it was, you know, it predated Occupy Wall Street, but there's an occu, there's a, it's main street versus Wall Street driven economy."
00:25:56,"Yeah. Right. That's kind of what localism is. It touches on a bunch of different things like local renewable food systems, local renewable energy or local sustainable food systems, local renewable energy, local media. And so I was really interested in that stuff and in, I guess Coworking kind of inter, I mean, for me it intersected with that. Yeah."
00:26:18,"And, and somehow I just kind of stumbled upon Coworking as a movement Yeah. And started researching it. And then I just, I had a very good year in 2008. I did a lot of really interesting projects and then work slowed down a little bit. And so I had this time and it was just a little bit flush. I mean, relative for,"
00:26:40,"for me, I mean this was, this was at actually the recession, right? 2008. Right. End of was like, okay, well that's a good year to have a good Year. Yeah. Well, so year, it's funny, it's like, you know, people say that's a good time to start something. Yep. Right. I,"
00:26:55,"that wasn't a conscious, it wasn't a conscious decision for me. It just, it just so happened I had time and energy and really was excited about doing something locally. And so I just started researching and that's when I discovered that Google group and, you know, all those early pioneers and got so much help from them and just researched different models and Wow."
00:27:17,"And, you know, I very quickly threw it all together. And then I, yeah, I went and found a lease. I mean, at the time the vacancy rate on Main Street in Beacon was in the high thirties. Again, this was, this was in the recession. Yeah. Beacon was it also, But it also fit your mission of like,"
00:27:32,"I can totally, I'm gonna sign a lease. Totally. I'm gonna, I'm gonna make use of this space. We're gonna eat lunch on Main Street and Gonna bring some vibrancy, do some interesting events and bring people to this space. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Okay. So you started with a small room with some desks, like kind of a dedicated desk?"
00:27:49,"Or was it all assigned seats? Dedicated mfl. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Not even a meeting room or phone booth or anything like that. I, and then I think about maybe a year and a half in the second floor of the building came available and that was, I think about maybe 15, 1600 square feet. So I took that over."
00:28:08,"It was one really large room. There had been cubicles in there, and then a separate room and a little kitchen and a bathroom. And so I turned the separate room into a meeting room. And then the large room actually built out, my landlord built them for me, five small rooms that we made into small offices, 75, 80 square feet to the largest one was two 20 or something."
00:28:30,"Okay. And so then I had, you know, our main room kind of lounge desks, dedicated flex event space, and then the second floor with some private offices and such. Okay. Got it. Yeah. Perfect. Okay. And Then, and then actually, well, so, and then I think like six, six or nine months after opening,"
00:28:52,"this is before we took over the second floor. There's a, a, a, a really good locally owned magazine, regional magazine called Chrono Graham. It's a monthly free, like glossy, you know, large format magazine. I knew the founders, I'd met them at some point just in, you know, whatever, being in the region. And I told them about Beahive before I actually opened as I was opening."
00:29:15,"And they owned a building in Kingston, which is where their office was. And it was a three story building. I think their offices were the second floor, the first floor was retail storefront, and it was empty. And so they, they asked me to open a Beahive there, and I'm like, well, let me open in Beacon first. And,"
00:29:35,"and so I did. And then a few months later we actually, we partnered and here's the, the thing. We just kind of threw together this kind of what eventually became a management agreement. Okay. Like what people call that now. Definitely. Nobody knew. Yeah. Yeah. I didn't know that. No, we didn't know, we didn't know it had a term."
00:29:53,"We just kind of came work. You're just Like, okay, how Can we came up with this? Exactly. Right. You know, we'll, we'll share everything and we'll, we'll have some sort of revenue share and it'll be the Beahive brand and Beahive management manage it. You guys will help 'cause you're there. Whatever. Yeah. So that was,"
00:30:08,"you know, that was the second location. I think that was November or December of 2009. So literally like six, seven months after, after opening. And then, you know, that lasted maybe two and a half, three years and whatever. But that was It. That's how we started. I, I love it. Hey there, I'm jumping in again this time."
00:30:31,"I am speaking to those of you that have, are either getting ready to hire a Community Manager or who have a Community Manager and you would like to support their training and development. We know how challenging it can be for Coworking space operators to create their own training and development material to support their community managers. And this is so important in terms of onboarding new community managers and supporting the growth of your existing community managers."
00:31:03,"And we're getting towards the end of the year, what a great holiday gift end of year gift to give to your Community Manager. So the platform is really around a couple of things. One is access to a community of like-minded folks. We have a very active Slack group with really wonderful questions that are posed every single day. And we find that's one of the biggest values."
00:31:28,"We have community managers from all over the world. And this is an excellent group of community managers that have invested time and effort into getting better at that role. And they are the kind of folks that you want your Community Manager to be by and hanging out with. And they know their stuff or sometimes they don't and they ask questions and we help them out."
00:31:49,"So I'm in the group, we have coaches that are in the group to support them. So we love when they ask questions for things they need help with because the other aspect of the program is really around helping them get resources they need to make their jobs easier and to learn things that they can use in their role to be better at their job. So we provide some done for you resources like Google business posts,"
00:32:16,"detailed event ideas, et cetera, that they can just kind of grab and go and use. And we also provide monthly resources that add to our training library so they can do our certification. And then we have a lot of electives that help them kind of get better at all the things that, that go with the role. So the, our community managers wear a lot of hats."
00:32:40,"So we break our content into industry knowledge for new community managers, community building operations, sales and marketing and leadership. So the leadership bucket is great for our more advanced community managers. We also have virtual office and digital mail training and coffee training for anybody who needs to know how to use commercial coffee brewers. So we are have some of the, I'm just gonna give you kind of a sampling of content that we have."
00:33:13,"So in our community building modules, we have hosting your first member events, building community with budget friendly events, member events, swipe files, our sales and marketing modules. We have tour training, we have the training on the full Coworking sales funnel, so they understand what that looks like. We have social media planning frameworks. We have, what else do we have?"
00:33:44,"Three simple steps to an effective marketing newsletter. These are just some of our samples. Ooh. These are some of our best utilized topics. Demystifying the process of letting your Coworking members use your address for their Google business listing, how to close a tour operations modules, how to set up automations, how to do a new member onboarding audit. Simple ways to use AI to boost your productivity."
00:34:10,"We have over 40 courses in the program, so we cover kind of higher level topics, and then we also cover things that are timely, like the CMRA updates, Google business updates, et cetera. So we get together monthly to do official training, and we also host a best practice sharing call, which is one of the fan favorites of the group and the Slack group."
00:34:36,"So if you have any questions at all about the program, don't hesitate to reach out. You can learn more and register at Everything Coworking dot com slash Community Manager. Now back to our episode. Okay. Wait, so well tell me we're, we're gonna keep going on the early days. How did, how did you, Coworking was not really a term no WeWork yet."
00:34:59,"I mean, WeWork was, WeWork was maybe a few months after I started. So it was, they were in 2009. Yeah. Ah, Okay. But they, and in New York, so you're getting a sprinkling of that, but still not mainstream. No. It's, so how did you get members? How did people learn about what's Beahive? What do we do with Beahive?"
00:35:19,"Well, I mean, before I opened, you know, I I, I did some, I you're A PR guy. Okay. So you Went, I'm a PR guy. Like I know how to do this. I organized, and, you know, beacon's a small community. Yeah. So, and there are the right people there. You know,"
00:35:33,"there was the right demographic of folks who had fled the city. Most of them worked for themselves. And I just, you know, I brought people together and said, Hey, here's what I'm thinking. Here's the mission and the vision. Here's the model. And, you know, I signed up a core. I mean, this is what the movement,"
00:35:51,"what used to do in the early days, right. You would sign up, you would get a core group Yeah. Together. You didn't just build it and they would come, you, you would actually engage and, and, and organize and build community before you opened. And that's what I did. And so it made it pretty easy. And again,"
00:36:08,"we started small and, you know, I just bootstrapped it. I mean, I, there was a Sears store in the next town over that was clo I think it was Sears. They were closing. They had an office in the back of that, of the st that sounds, yeah. They had an office in the back of the store with a bunch of desks."
00:36:25,"And I bought I think maybe six or seven desks for like $30 total. Like just, and there's a, there's, there's a used office furniture place across the river. And I bought some like basic Carmen Miller chair for maybe 50 bucks a piece. I mean, I really bootstrapped this thing. Yeah. And I mean, the building was beautiful. It didn't need anything."
00:36:47,"It was a gorgeous 1904 building. Yeah. I mean, he, The toast architecture. I know. Anytime it Well, yeah. And, and actually, yeah. And, and an artisan owned it and she had spent, you know, some time renovating it. It was beautiful brick and just so I didn't need a, I didn't put any money into the space itself,"
00:37:05,"itself, the actual physical. Yeah. Yeah. Which is a big deal. Right. Because Yeah. To not have to do that these days, Depending. I know, I mean, I, the relocation five months. Oh, you just did that? Yeah, I just did that. And I, you know, I, I mean, I'm,"
00:37:23,"I'm still paying. I mean, there's loans that are pay off for years, but I'm still paying the contractor who's been Right. Generous to allow me to, you know, to delay on some of the payments. Yeah. I mean, it's crazy what, what it costs now. It's like a totally different experience from 14 years ago. Yeah, totally."
00:37:38,"It's like legit now. Yeah. Okay. So you're, wait, your web website says Beacon in Newburgh And cold springing? Yeah, so I've had several that have opened and closed over the years. So Kingston, you know, 6, 7, 8 months, whatever, after opening that lasted I think about two and a half, three years. And then, you know,"
00:38:01,"we decided to close it for a number of reasons. I mean, it was, I still didn't have the right model for managing, you know, new Kingston is 45 minutes away. Okay. Our spaces aren't large enough where we have staff. Right. No. Right. So yeah. Still didn't have it quite worked out how to manage it remotely,"
00:38:19,"you know, 45 minutes away. Yeah. I, I couldn't go up there every day. I didn't want to. They're busy running their magazine. So, you know, we, we did some really cool stuff and it was relatively successful for a while, and then it just didn't make sense anymore. So we closed it. But in 2012, so I guess it was three years,"
00:38:41,"almost three years to the day, three years to the month after opening a beacon, we opened in Albany, which is a much larger market. And that was a case where this successful real estate, commercial real estate broker, very successful in, in Albany, very well known, owned a building, had a space available and read about Beahive in an,"
00:39:04,"in-flight magazine. And reached out. And so then I ended up partnering with her. Same thing, you know, management agreement. Yeah. Whatever we called it. By that point I had learned a little bit, you know, from my experience in Kingston. So it was a little bit more formalized and, you know, the, the contract was more of a contract."
00:39:24,"It was, it was better structured, you know, I had a lawyer draft that, whereas before I think we just kind of threw something together. Yeah. And so, and actually we just closed that one last month. So it was over 11 years we had had the Albany space and it kind of evolved in different ways over the years. Wait,"
00:39:41,"and Albany is how far from you? Hour and a half. Okay. Straight up the throughway. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And it's the state capital. But it, you know, it's weird because my, my partner there, I, I didn't, I wasn't involved in Day-to-Day at all. Okay. And I rarely went there. In fact,"
00:39:56,"in the last eight years, I mean, I, I went a few times. I mean, I just didn't go up there. Yeah. And it's, it's because it didn't quite fit the mission and vision that I was the brand. Like her market. Yeah. Yeah. A different market. And she's different. And for her it was a real estate play in a way."
00:40:16,"I mean, she's very involved in the community, but still was, you know, it was mostly a real estate play. 'cause that's what she is. Yeah. And so it, it never quite fit, you know, it lasted 11 years. 'cause it, it just sort of, you know, she ran it and I just sort of let it go."
00:40:29,"And I mean, she's mostly given up her practice now, and she gave up the building, actually. So that's basically why we closed it. And yeah. So that, you know, we opened in Albany in 2012, and then I went back to Kingston. So there's a community development, affordable housing, nonprofit. There's a couple in the region."
00:40:49,"There's a really big one called Ruco in Kingston. And they were, they were renovating an old warehouse in Kingston and turning it into affordable housing for artists. And I think there are like 52 or 53 units, something like that. And Common Space. And I reached out to them. I, I knew, knew the folks. I've done a lot of other work in the region,"
00:41:11,"which we can talk about or not, but I had a nonprofit, for example, a localism nonprofit for a number of years. So I knew the folks that I reached out to them and said, Hey, maybe we can partner and put a Beahive in there and, you know, it'd be a free amenity for the resident, like the artists. And then open to membership to non-residents,"
00:41:29,"like usual. And there'd be this great interchange, you know, or exchange, whatever, between artists who need business support and, you know, typical Beahive members who could use a little creative impo, whatever. Anyway, made sense. And so we did that. And again, it's, you know, it, it, managing it was a little bit complicated."
00:41:58,"Now, the, the, the building had a, I guess a property slash Community Manager Yeah. Who also helped manage Beahive. But it, it was a little bit loose in how all of that worked. You know, I'm sure this is sort of part of the learning process over the years about how to make Yeah, no, I love it."
00:42:16,"Yeah. Yeah. It's like you Experimented, you did all these things before anybody else was doing them, like Yeah, yeah. Sort of. I mean, at that point, yeah. That was I think 2015 when we back went back to Kingston. So it was, I mean, it was more or less mainstreamed by then. Is that right?"
00:42:31,"2015? I think that's right. So we only lasted maybe a year, year and a half there. And there are a number of reasons why it didn't work. Part of it was the sort of the lack of, you know, the looseness around roles and structure and all that kind of stuff. Yeah. And again, you know, and Ruco is a nonprofit and it's,"
00:42:50,"it's an affordable housing complex. So it was, it was just a little bit funny. And there was, you know, weirdness in the way that the residents interacted with our paying members. And, you know, it's a business in there, you know, so it was just kind of a weird thing that never quite got fully worked out. Yep."
00:43:10,"But Kingston now, actually, so we were early both times we were there too early. I think Kingston, I'm not sure if you heard about it, but during the pandemic became the fastest growing, you know, municipality in the country. Okay. Because everyone escaped the city. Yeah. And there's a large, so it's not on the train line."
00:43:32,"Okay. But it is the Hudson Valley, and it's kind of the gateway to the Catskills, which is where everyone escaped to. Yeah. So, so many people moved to, to Kingston during the pandemic, real estate prices went through the roof, like a huge change. And now, now it's a thing. Now there are two vibrant Coworking spaces there."
00:43:52,"I mean, when we were there, obviously there was none. Yeah. So we were sort of too early and left. Yeah. And, you know, I, I talked to various folks over the years, years to try to partner and, and reopen there. And it just never happened. And then, I mean, now it's, you know,"
00:44:09,"we wouldn't go there. I mean, it doesn't make sense. Yeah. It's also still a small community. I think the population is 20, 25,000. Okay. And then there's two vibrant spaces there. Yep. So around the time we went back to Kingston, we also opened in Peekskill, which is about half an hour south of Beacon. So closer to the city."
00:44:27,"Also another river town. Not as developed at the time as, certainly as Beacon. And not even really as much as Kingston, but one of those river towns where people were moving to, right. Yeah. People from the city. So there was a right demographic, just small, and that was very short-lived. That was a case where it wasn't the right partnership,"
00:44:50,"you know, we, we, we didn't have, it just wasn't the right fit for a number of reasons. And yeah, I mean, I think what you're running into just, you know, again, there's just like more on the internet, you were still making it up. There are not that many like management partnership type things that get done."
00:45:09,"And you were really like, let's try it. Let's See. Well, and also like, these are, see, you know, it's harder. I mean, you've done a lot of rural Coworking, you know, conversations over the years. Yep. And I, and certainly in the, in the Facebook group there is, I mean, that's only in the last,"
00:45:27,"what, five, seven years that that's been been a thing. Yeah. And I mean, you know, you can question whether you call the Hudson Valley rural. Certainly some areas are, maybe exurban is better. Yeah. But we're talking small communities. Yeah. And so the models don't quite, yeah. They're not the same as a Coworking space in a major metropolitan area that has hundreds of members and thousands and thousands of square feet."
00:45:49,"So it's a little bit harder. So I've always just kind of making it up as I go along. Yeah. But even, you know, some Partnership piece, you know, managing remotely, how when you can't staff with your own people that you've trained, how do you instill the culture? Like there's a, you know, it, it is hard."
00:46:07,"Which I think is, is what you learned. And Well, also, partnerships are hard even in in general. In general In general, because sometimes, sometimes you seem like you're in alignment and then, and you know, words are shallow. Right. So people will sometimes say certain things, and then that's not always the case once you actually Yeah."
00:46:30,"You know, month to month are trying to run things. Right. So, so yeah. Anyway, it was short-lived in, in, in peak scale. Yeah. Okay. Got it. Okay. So, so three locations now. Yeah. So here's the thing, you know, I've always still been doing my PR and communications. Yeah, I was gonna ask about that."
00:46:50,"Okay. And about, and, and I had this, I mentioned just briefly, I had this nonprofit for a number of years, and I co-founded. I eventually became the board chair. And I did a lot of other kind of community initiatives in the region that didn't pay me. So I was really about maybe five years ago I was strung out."
00:47:09,"I was, I was way too spread, too thin. And Beahive was always sort of, I mean, it was my thing and it was a business, but it was always sort of a thing, you know, one of many things. Yeah. And about five years ago, I, I, I realized there's a lot more I wanted to do with Beahive,"
00:47:29,"and I was spread too thin. And so I, I worked with a coach to, to, to work out like, I need to peel off some of this stuff. And I, I eventually left the nonprofit and started peeling off some of the other stuff and started to focus on Beahive more. And so then I started reaching out again proactively to look for potential partners to open in other,"
00:47:53,"other cities with a more kind of focused effort. Right. And also, I'd learned so much at that point, you know, I knew how I was gonna structure things better from a, from a, from a sort of legal, you know, you know, partnership structure, but also operationally. Yeah. Right. Yep. And, and at this point,"
00:48:15,"Beahive's such a, had such a strong brand in the region. Anyway, so I, I made this concerted effort and I connected with some, a, a big time developer slash GC in Poughkeepsie. And we talked about, they were developing a project, they're pretty big multi-use project there. Food hall and a market, and a couple of floors of apartments and a Coworking space."
00:48:41,"And so we were gonna be the Coworking space. And so that was a conversation that happened, you know, that was ongoing for a while. 'cause it was a big project and they were getting funding from the state and whatever, like grants or whatever, economic development stuff. They were also involved in a project in Newburgh. So Poughkeepsie is about 20 minutes,"
00:49:02,"half an hour north of us on the river as well. Actually, it's the terminus of the same train line of the line. Okay. Yeah. And you've heard of ppic, like Poughkeepsie is all shows up in the, you know, TV shows and films all the time. It's the end of the train line, Hyde Park, which is where FDR was from."
00:49:17,"It's just below it. Newburgh is literally across the river from us. I'm looking at it now, actually. It's, it's right across the river. Okay. They were also involved in this project in Newburgh, multi-use project, you know, multimillion dollar renovation of an old factory, whatever. And so we talked about opening there as well. So these were conversations that were happening before the pandemic."
00:49:42,"And, you know, the nature of renovating old buildings, especially in this region, and, and, and especially when you're getting grants, you know, economic, economic development grants. There were a seven apartments in, in Newburgh, and they were, it was a new state program, a kind of affordable housing thing. So they're, they're below market apartments and,"
00:50:03,"and they were also focusing on artists. So, you know, those kinds of things delay, right. So these conversations, I think were going on for a couple of years. The conversations and the planning process, right? Yeah. Yeah. And then the pandemic hit. Yeah. And so just as I was starting to invest more time and, and,"
00:50:24,"and some money, but time and energy into Beahive, the pandemic hit. And, you know, there was a lot of uncertainty and it obviously delayed construction and all of that. But we went ahead and we opened in Newburgh in January of 2021. So nine, 10 months after the pandemic hit. And actually we did, we did pretty well there."
00:50:45,"Like we, we, we filled it up pretty quickly within a few months. I think we had 14 private offices there, and I think by month two 80% were occupied. And then, you know, there were a couple of the larger ones left, and then by maybe month three or four, they were all full. And then, you know,"
00:51:05,"we, the flex space was, was filling up too. So we, we were doing pretty well. Yeah. Things were, were starting to rebound. I mean, a couple months after opening the vaccine, you know, got distributed. So, Okay. But still, that was still like, you know, early, early re-emergence For sure. And,"
00:51:22,"and you know what, and, and I have to tell you my, my job, like probably a lot of Coworking folks before we opened to Newburgh, Newburgh was a, you know, management agreement. Okay. So I had, I didn't, you know, I didn't have money invested in it. Right. Yeah. That's all the partner and they were doing that."
00:51:38,"But Beacon, I mean, my job became trying to get funding. Right? PPP Yeah. Idle loans, all that stuff. Yeah. Emergency grants from local nonprofits and stuff. I mean, that's what I did because, you know, my revenue went like this. Yeah. The building, the building had sold three months before the pandemic hit. And I signed a new three-year lease and the,"
00:52:03,"because Beacon being Beacon the rent. Yeah. You know, just kept going up. So I had this brand new lease with a brand new landlord who gave me no concessions, nothing. Oh. And, and then the pandemic hit and my revenue just went Right. So I spent all my time trying to just stay afloat basically. So yeah, that's that."
00:52:25,"And that was that. And then we opened it in Newburg and Poughkeepsie's things happened there and we ended up not partnering with nf. Okay. Okay. So right now, you know, we have Beacon and Newburg, our main spaces. We have what I call an annex in the next town south of us called in Cold Spring and Annex, I had opened one in Beacon in 2019 down the street from our flagship."
00:52:49,"It's just private offices. So there's no Coworking, there are no meeting rooms, no events. And that's what we have in Cold Spring. Cold Spring is also on the train line. It's a, gets a lot of tourists. It has one of the most popular hiking destinations, certainly on the East coast, if not the country. A lot of people,"
00:53:08,"because it's train line, a lot of people come up from the city and so they get a lot of tourists. But it's a, you know, it's a vibrant little community where people live until we opened an annex of seven private offices there. Got it. Okay. So that's, those are the three locations we have currently. Okay. So talk about,"
00:53:25,"yeah. Team staffing. 'cause you had posted about your ambassador program and I, you know, you've got on your blog, you've got an ambassador profile. Yeah, yeah. What does that look like? Because I know people ask about that all the time, or people assume they have to be fully staffed, which is very hard in smaller spaces, but you need somebody sort of minding Yeah."
00:53:47,"You know, you learn that right. From some of your remote locations. It's like, well, you need somebody who's Right. Yeah. So, yeah, talk about kind of the genesis of that and what it looks like. Yeah. So again, this is sort of, you know, trying things and making it up as I go along. I don't remember at what point I started doing something like that,"
00:54:08,"and it wasn't called community, like Community Community Ambassador program. I, that is something I, I just packaged it maybe a couple of years ago and called it that before. It was like an internship in quotes. Okay. Well in quotes, because, you know, I've had a several folks who kind of had an internship with Beahive over the years,"
00:54:29,"but they were maybe five, 10 years outta school. Like, they weren't, they weren't in school, so it wasn't really an internship. Got it. It's just that, you know, maybe they were new to Beacon and they wanted to, or the area and Beahive being what it was and the, and the brand and the, you know, the,"
00:54:45,"the, the presence it had in the region and the fact that we were pioneering and, you know, was this cool thing and did a lot of cool community things. People would reach out and say, Hey, you're looking for help. And so I would just kind of bring them on and like Yeah. You know, help me plan programs and,"
00:55:01,"you know, just kind of help me manage, you know, the physical aspects of the space, operational stuff, but in a very loose, unpaid way because, you know, I didn't have the, there was no budget to to to pay folks. Yeah. So, again, I just, you know, sort of would take people on who would reach out,"
00:55:21,"or maybe I would ask someone, and obviously they would get membership and you know, they would, they would get things out of it. So it was a, it was a kind of win-win. And there are people I've hired from time to time over the years. I mean, I have someone now, so I call them a community activator. And that's a very part-time,"
00:55:39,"you know, paid position. In fact, Sammy who, who has been in that position now for a couple of years, has a full-time job. But when she, when she started working with me, she didn't have a full-time job. She was kind of a, you know, she was doing her own kind of consulting thing. And she had just moved to Newburgh."
00:55:58,"And this is probably maybe a few months after we opened to Newburgh. She had just moved to Newburgh. She was one of the ones who fled the city during the pandemic. And she became a member. And soon after she joined, I asked, I hired her, I said, Hey, you know, I'm looking for part-time help. So I hired her as a,"
00:56:17,"as a community activator. And then the community ambassador program, which is what we call it now, I say that there are two elements to it. There's membership exchange, which is a sort of quid pro quo, whatever, I guess quid pro quo, I don't know if that's the right term to use, but just an exchange free membership. You're part of the community and you just help us out."
00:56:37,"You know, we ask for a commitment of at least one or two, four hour shifts a week, you know, scheduled in the same days. Okay. And I think a three month commitment or something. Three or six months? I think Just three months. Yeah. Again, 'cause it's so sort of, you know, loose. Yep. And it's really just to be on site."
00:56:57,"They don't really do a lot. It's just to answer questions. Give, give a tour. Yeah. You know, if there's a, if there's a meeting door Yeah. Yeah. If there, if there's a non-member renting a meeting room, you know Yeah. Kind of orienting them, showing them the space, et cetera. It's pretty basic stuff."
00:57:12,"And making, There's no member onboarding, there's no logging into things. No, there can be. And that can be a part of it. Mostly. I do that or Sammy does that. Okay. And a lot of the onboarding, I mean, we can talk about this operational, how that's changed over the years. 'cause there's so many pro,"
00:57:27,"you know, platforms now that didn't exist when we started. Yeah. That's a lot of that is, is streamlined. Right. Pretty automated and Yeah, it's pretty automated. You know, we, we, we do the human touch as much as we can, but, but we automate as much as we can too. You know, high, what's the,"
00:57:43,"the term? High touch, high tech. High touch, right? I think, I think that's the term. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So we try to do that as much as possible. So that's membership exchange and or we could do a, an actual internship. And I have had one formal internship over the years. Someone who, who went to school nearby and SUNY purchased,"
00:58:04,"which is maybe half an hour away, who lived actually closer to us. And that was an intern, you know, formalized internship through their, through their school. So we could do that as well, you know. Yeah. And, you know, it's, it really, it, it's, it's, I mean, we have suggestions, but it's a case by case basis."
00:58:24,"What do they wanna get out of it and what can we provide? You know, we have a lot of different kinds of members and we do all kinds of events. And so, you know, they can be as engaged in the, in Beahive's business as much as they want to be or not, or in members too, you know, helping out members."
00:58:44,"So Yeah. You know, it's a packaged program, but it's also very kind of case by case basis. That's customizable. Yeah. Yeah. So In general, your culture, like do your members make their own coffee? Yeah, but you know, we're, we're, I mean, in Beacon especially, there's a, a coffee shop. I mean,"
00:59:05,"we probably have six coffee shops in a town of 15,000, a mile long Main Street, because it's that kind of community. And a new, a new one opened up across the street from us two weeks after we, in our new location. Okay. Our relocation, super fancy, you could find it. In fact, they own one in Tribeca in the city."
00:59:23,"You know, they sell Shinola products as well. Like, it's, it's coffee and Mercantile. It's super fancy. They have 19 brewing methods and it's across the street. So yes, people make their own coffee, but mostly they just go out. They'll go out and buy. We have, we have great coffee shops, and it's like, it's a Amazing,"
00:59:41,"It's better to, you know, you break up the day a little bit. Yeah. And support a local business. Somebody's gotta support business. Those six, six coffee shops, Right? Yes. That's hilarious. But Yeah, a lot of, I mean, you know, operationally in a small, in a small space, right? Yeah. A town of 15,000."
00:59:59,"I mean, we have about 70 members in Beacon. You know, we don't have hundreds, so we don't have full-time reception. Right. It is members, there is an expectation that members will wash their dishes. Yeah. They'll clean up after themselves. Yeah. You know, they can obviously book a phone booth or meeting room themselves to, we use Exodus and I,"
01:00:19,"you know, I've set all that stuff up, I'm told pretty well because I've been doing it for so long and I have a communications background, so I know how to ah, present things. Right. And I don't know, I guess I'm a little OCD on things too, so I, I I I think it runs pretty smoothly and, and,"
01:00:41,"you know, people have told me this and, and from doing it from so long and being so hands-on, you know, I learn what works and what doesn't. Yeah. So we don't have to, we don't have to have someone on site full-time, you know? No. We have a code to, I love hearing this because I do think people make that assumption."
01:00:59,"I also think it's not that easy, to your point, like, you've packaged things, you've set a tone, you've built a culture. So people kind of like learn new members, learn how to sort of integrate into that and what is the expectation and how do we do this. Like, if you had members leaving dishes all over the place and Right."
01:01:17,"And we do onboard members, you know, I said a lot of it's automated and we have an FAQ, you know, nexus makes that easy. It's our basically our members' handbook, which used to be APDF, you know, and it's, again, there's a lot of stuff, like everything is in there, as you probably know, people don't always read."
01:01:34,"Yeah. And I have to remind people from time to time. Yeah. But, you know, we sit down with every member. We, first of all, we meet everyone before they join. We don't have before. We can't sign up online. Yeah. Right. That's it. They Come in for a tour. So you meet everyone, They come in for a tour,"
01:01:48,"we wanna meet everyone. Occasionally we'll talk to someone, like if we can't meet them and they really wanna join before they're moving to town or whatever. Yeah. We'll talk to 'em. We get a feel. Right. We have, that's part of the expectation too, right? We, we wanna make sure that they know this is not a Regis,"
01:02:03,"it's not a fully self-served thing. Yeah. It's not a culture. Right. So, yeah. Mm. No, that's important though, right? Because there's a fit. Right. And not everybody's, yeah. Not everybody. There's a cultural fit. And again, expectations, right? Yeah. Like, we don't want, you know, I'm very sensitive to,"
01:02:20,"to, I mean, it's my thing. I'm very sensitive to people not having a good experience. And so you need to set expectation. I mean, you know, I, I was a long time consultant. You set expectations with clients too, right? Like, we can't get you on a front page of the New York Times. Like Yeah. You know,"
01:02:37,"some people, some PR publicists may tell you that, but yeah, I'm gonna be real, like, you know, you have to set expectations. I just think that's the right way to operate. Yeah. So, yeah. No, I love that. So, is Newburgh, how is Newburgh staffed? Is that an ambassador? Or You have Sammy,"
01:02:54,"you mentioned Sammy. She's there, we don't Have any, yeah, so Sammy lives in Newburgh. She basically manages it. And again, she's not on site all the time. Okay. She goes in when she needs to. Yeah. She'll she'll if we have non-members renting a meeting room, for example, if she can't physically meet them, she'll talk to them beforehand."
01:03:11,"And we, you know, we have, she gives them a call. Yeah. And all that stuff, again, is pretty well laid out. We have a bookings guide, talks about parking and all that stuff. And they, they get all that digitally, but sa you know, Sammy will either meet them or talk to them and go through it all beforehand."
01:03:26,"Because again, people don't read always. Well, this Is the thing. This came up in, in one of our groups recently. They're like, okay, so we're not fully staffed. And the manager wanted to like, take time off. Right. And so she's like, I'm really trying to audit all of our processes to make sure, because she's like,"
01:03:43,"people right. Just won't read. And, you know, you put the, the sign on the door, the QR code on the door and people just don't, I like the phone call because at least, you know, maybe get somebody live, you've made an extra connection effort. Pretty simple for sure. But yeah, that can, and People appreciate it."
01:04:00,"Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, listen, we, we, I'd say 90, at least in Beacon, I, Sammy as I mentioned, she, she now has a full-time job and has for a while. So she can't always physically meet folks. I mean, she works remotely, but Yeah. You know, but she has calls."
01:04:18,"She's at home working, I'd say 90% of the time we physically meet folks. New members or non-members are in meeting room in Newburgh and in Beacon, because I live in New bi Beacon and, you know, it's, it's basically my full-time thing. Now. It's probably 98% of the time Okay. That I will, I will physically meet folks because I'm wanna What Happens,"
01:04:41,"what happens when Scott goes on vacation? Well, Sammy will cover, Sammy will cover, and usually I still like, you know, I'm always working remotely. I'll still check emails and stuff. Now there are times, you know, I have a pretty intense meditation per practice, and I will do silent retreats and I'm not reachable at all, like,"
01:05:00,"not even texts, whatever the phone's off. Right? Yeah. Thank God I have Sammy for, for those times. And you know, I make sure that there's autoresponders and all that. Yeah. And members will know, listen, I'm away for a week. Sammy will cover reach out to her. Yeah. And again, because of the expectations and the things are automated,"
01:05:18,"so well runs pretty smoothly. But, you know, that has been an issue over the years. You know, I, there have been times when I didn't feel comfortable going away. I didn't have, you know, a, a community activator at the time. And so I would always be reluctant and certainly to do a silent retreat because I'm literally not reachable."
01:05:37,"Not Yeah. The Burn Down and literally you're Not Yeah. And I'm not checking emails like I can't. Right. So that is, that is one of the drawbacks of, you know, running a small space and not having staff at least full-time staff, Which, so, and can, can you ask the am is the ambassador role set up to cover some of that time as well?"
01:05:58,"Yeah, but It's very limited. I mean, they're not paid, right? Yeah. So if, if they have, you know, one or like one shift a week, like they're there for, they're not covering four, five hours. Yeah, exactly. Got It. Yeah. Okay. So, and I've made it work over the years."
01:06:12,"You know, my previous landlord before she sold the building in, in Beacon, for example, she was great. You said, I think before the call started about your landlord. Oh yes. In, in California Barbecue. I had a great relationship. She was an honorary member. She was a presence in the building. It's a small building, like two floors,"
01:06:30,"whatever. So she would kind of be around too, right? Yeah. Okay. So, oh, we're almost out of time. Sorry, I'm just Blagging. No, I love it. I love your story. That's why I was like, people always want questions. And I'm like, well, if I, it's, I can give you the list,"
01:06:46,"but I'm not sure until we start talking. So I No, I, it's super interesting. I mean, you're, you're like a rare, you know, you there, there's not many people who have been doing this as long as you now Yeah. Jerome is still around. Alex Hillman is still Around. Totally. Is still around. Yes. And Alex Totally."
01:07:05,"And Tony does some interesting, what do, do you know what, I'm trying to remember what Tony is doing right now. Something cool And, you know, community engagement. Yeah. Community engagement stuff. And he, he got married recently and I think he's moved to Connecticut. He's still in the area. Okay. Yeah. I haven't spoken to,"
01:07:23,"actually, he reached out, he was consulting with someone in Peekskill who bought a building and was thinking of doing a Coworking thing. He was consulting with them and he reached out to me. I can't remember if this was pre just before the pandemic or just after. Okay. And so he reached out because he knows I know the area Yeah. Of the region so much."
01:07:41,"I think that was the last time I talked to him. But yeah. Okay. So if you could tell your, give your 2009 self a couple of pieces of advice, what, what would it be? Oh, yeah. Wow. Think long term. 'cause even though I was building a brand and a vision, it's still, as I said,"
01:08:04,"it was always like one of the many things I did. And if I was always, even in Beacon with the initial, my initial landlord, I was always doing year to year. Right. And I wish I would've planned better. And, and maybe I wish I would've gotten partners to even, I tried to buy the building when she sold it a few years ago."
01:08:24,"Ah, okay. I, I couldn't make that happen, but I wish I would've thought about that before and tried to buy properties. I'm not a real estate guy. I mean, I've learned what I learned to make. I work. Yeah. But I, I don't like that world, honestly. That said, I wish I would've engaged with it more and,"
01:08:47,"and learned a little bit more about it and tried to get partners to buy property because obvi, I mean, I know you've, I, I'm pretty sure you've talked about this a lot on the podcast. It's great. The building. Yeah, yeah. And, and you know, different ways of making, you know, management agreements or owning and whatever."
01:09:05,"So I, I mean, financially I think it probably makes more sense, especially 'cause real estate being what it is. Yeah. And also you have more autonomy. Right. You have more control. This is part of the reason, the issue I had when the building sold in our flagship is the, the, the, the, there were just too many constraints on us that my previous landlord did not give us."
01:09:27,"Besides, we had outgrown the space and, and the, you know, the rented whatever there, we just didn't have the autonomy that we, we needed to. You own the building, you have complete autonomy, right? Yeah. So Totally think long term. Okay. Gimme one more, Go into partnerships with, what's the expression? Like wider open eyes,"
01:09:55,"I guess. Yeah. You know, sometimes it's like, I guess, I mean, you know, the, in the business world, I've always equated business partners with relationships, right? It's like your wife, you know, it's like you getting married, right? Yeah. And, you know, and I mean that's, it's a bit extreme,"
01:10:10,"but there's some truth to that. And just like when you start a new re a romantic relationship, you'll overlook certain things because you wanna make it work or, And you're gather instance that this is gonna work, this is gonna be What I want. Yeah, it's fine. It could because all these other things. Yeah. You think all these other things overshadow those things."
01:10:27,"Yeah. So, you know, and that's certainly been, you know, my my case. It's like, oh, it's okay. It'll, it'll work out. You know? Yeah. Watch, watch for those red flags. And sometimes they do work out, but, you know, notice them, I guess a little bit, heed them a little more,"
01:10:45,"do need Them. I like, yes. That's a good way to put it. Good way to put it. Okay. Scott, what are you gonna, how are you gonna spend your weekend? Oh my God, I never know. Oh, what, what am I doing this weekend? I don't have any plans actually. Are you a hiker?"
01:11:00,"A cooker and I'm a, yeah. Hi. I mean, beacon is this great hiking in the region, but I will say, actually, so I mentioned we relocated five months ago and I kind of, last weekend there was a second annual Beacon Bonfire Fest, 150 different concerts and events happening in the beacon up and down Main Street, 25 different venues."
01:11:23,"Beahive was a venue and we, we programmed and, and we suggested this to the Beacon Bonfire organizers. We programmed wellness, a wellness corner each day. So we had I think four or five things happening each day. And then there were regular kind of music performances at night at Beahive two as part of the regular bonfire stuff. And it felt so good because we really activated this space in the way that we haven't since we relocated moved."
01:11:53,"Yeah. And we haven't done a lot of stuff since Covid. Yeah. Even though pre Covid, that's, you know, a main reason I started Beahive, it felt so, so good. And the weather was beautiful. People were out in the streets and it just, I mean, one of the performances we had Saturday night, I came back from seeing my perf,"
01:12:12,"my partner performed down the street. She was performing as one of the 150 concerts. And so I came back and we, you know, we had a performance. So I came back and they were still doing talent check. I had, I had set up, you know, we were supposed to have chill performances at our space. I had set up seats for just maybe 15 or 20 people."
01:12:29,"And I walked in and there were probably 70 people. Ooh, nice. And so, yeah. And so I'm like, oh my God, I'm pushing people outta the way moving plants to make more room and pulling chairs outta the conference room. And it just was, it just was beautiful. Anyway, that was last weekend and it was so exhausting because,"
01:12:46,"you know, not, not only Bhi be in a venue in hosting, but I went to a lot of things too. So anyway, I think I'm chill this weekend. Nice. But chill and re-energized, it sounds like. Yeah, yeah. Kind of really connected with your why for this space, which is Totally, And it just felt, again,"
01:13:02,"like we haven't done anything of that scale since the pandemic, and certainly not in this newly Yeah. You know, relocated and renovated space. And it just, it just, it, it reene energized me for Beahive for sure, in terms of events and community engagement. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I could talk to you forever, but now we are officially over time,"
01:13:23,"so I'm gonna let you go. Great. Thank you for taking time to do this. I'm gonna link to Beahive in the show notes, which you can see if you're listening on your phone, you can just kind of click the link and see what they're up to. You have a beautiful website. I, the thing I like about your website is I get like this human vibe,"
01:13:39,"You know? Oh good. Lots of photos of people and you know, you just get this like human feeling versus, anyway, we won't talk about the verses, but Yeah. Right. It's great. Thank you for taking the time. It was great to get to know you. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Likewise. Thank you for listening to today's episode."
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