Building company community across time zones

...Not just working, co-working

We’ve joined the co-working trend this past year, too, coming in to a communal workspace every day with other local freelancers and entrepreneurs. The chance to plug into our community is better than working alone from home or in a single office. Plus, it gives us a chance to learn about similar business challenges and share our experiences with fellow “coworkers” who just happen to work for other businesses.

As a business developer, I find co-working spaces particularly motivating because I have an opportunity to share local resources, make connections and learn about the marketplace we’re all working in together.

By the way, if you happen to be reading this in Denver, New York or Austin, please stop by and say hi. We’d enjoy an afternoon chat or AM coffee at Green Spaces... (click here for the full story)

Workspaces In New York That Share Elements of Incubators

Freelance, writers and entrepreneurs can work from anywhere and they tend to operate from coffee houses and coffee shop/cafés.These startup workspaces provide a collaborative and conducive environment where you can hold your business meetings with your clients or team. They provide a one stop shop that can empower you as a freelancer.

Thanks for the mention, AlltopStartups! Click here for the full story.

Green Spaces Listed in Top 10 NYC Coworking Spaces

What is the one thing every young entrepreneur is looking for? Money! How to make it, how to save it, how to use it etc…Of course while bootstrapping a business every entrepreneur is looking for ways to keep what little money they do have but build an empire at the same time. Coworking is a relatively new option for business owners when it comes to getting office space.

If you don’t already know coworking centers are places that allow you to rent a desk, office, or simply come to hangout in an open room with other business owners doing the same thing. The centers will offer wifi, coffee, comfortable furniture, printing and of course an innovative setting. You have to signup for one of their packages that could range from $10 for a day pass to a few hundred dollars to rent your own desk for the month and a variety of options in between.

Whatever you do it becomes a cheaper and often more comfortable and innovative setting then renting your own private office space.

We put together a list last summer of the Top 10 Cities for Young Entrepreneurs and decided to now list all the coworking centers in those cities. We have also added a handful of cities to the list that were suggested in the previous article...

Thanks for the mention, Under30CEO! Click here for the full story and to see us listed among our peers.

Office space redefined in Downtown

In Downtown Express 

8.31.2011 BY HELAINA N. HOVTIZ  

No longer satisfied with lugging their laptops to Starbucks, Downtowners are turning to Lower Manhattan’s bevy of shared workspaces for a desk to call their own.

When the economic crises first hit, New Yorkers were left searching for alternative self-employment opportunities or a place to continue working independently after being laid off. Originally dubbed “Shared Space Movements” back in 2008, the growing trend offers Lower Manhattan residents working from home the chance to reconnect with the rest of the city...

Green Spaces is located at 394 Broadway. It is home to 80 members who share a lifestyle of health and sustainability, from environmentalists to non-profits to a diverse mix of independents that call the energy-efficient space home. Members are not required to have a green job to join, but they do have to share the green philosophy and sign a statement agreeing to adhere to the building’s eco-friendly policies. A full time desk is $550 a month, and open space is $250. Greenspaces does not offer private offices...

Click here for the full story.

Bloomberg Radio's "Taking Stock" with Pimm Fox and Courtney Donohoe

Green Spaces's Feinberg Discusses Eco-Friendly Offices: Audio

Marissa Feinberg, co-founder of Green Spaces, discusses eco-friendly office spaces. Feinberg talks with Bloomberg's Pimm Fox and Courtney Donohoe on Bloomberg Radio's "Taking Stock."

To listen to 8.29.11 show, click here:

http://media.bloomberg.com/bb/avfile/Markets/Analyst_Calls/vXXT71mHiUHI.mp3

Green Spaces & Founder Jennie Nevin in "The Big Enough Company - Creating a Business That Works for You"

Thanks, Adelaide and Amy, for mentioning our Founder, Jennie, and Green Spaces in your latest title! In their trailer, the authors mention, "The Big Enough Company is about creating work and life on your terms." Readers will learn from stories of entrepreneurs. A common theme is "bigger is not always better". The book aims to speak to entrepreneurs and convey confidence, putting different methods and models of business growth on the table, offering new options.

Huff Post New York: NYC Leads With Incubators for Green and Tech Startups

by John Tepper Marlin, @CityEconomist

The country is stuck in a liquidity paralysis. The Tea Party's debt exorcisers are pushing their case too hard at the wrong time. President Obama continues to have a big challenge to get the country moving again.

Yet there may be hope at the state and local level. The stimulus was not as effective as hoped, in part because state and local officials were expected to move faster than they were able. However, state and local officials and local entrepreneurs are now responding to the need for new jobs in interesting ways.

For example, last week New York City Mayor Bloomberg visited the Entrepreneur Space in Queens, New York. With him were and Rep. Carolyn Maloney (former Chair of the Joint Economic Committee of Congress) and other locally elected officials. The main stories were in the Queens Gazette or on the Mayor's website.

This visit deserves national attention at a time when job creation is Job 1. Bloomberg knows a thing or two about how to create jobs. Back in 1981, when incubators were few and the Fed had whipped up a severe inflation-fighting recession, Michael Bloomberg started to parlay his $10 million Salamon Brothers severance and shares into a giant company. Last I checked, Bloomberg L.P., still headquartered in New York, as of April 2011 employs more than 13,000 people in 166 locations around the world. Also, by bringing more transparency to capital markets, the company argues with some basis that it has contributed to growth of jobs outside of New York (though more transparency did not offset the meltdown in the nation's financial regulatory system).

Mr. Bloomberg's skill at building a business empire from scratch inspired scared New Yorkers to vote for him after 9/11. NYC elected an entrepreneur as mayor with the expectation that a successful business leader would surely would help the city hold on to its jobs and create new ones.

What the mayor is doing now, ten years after 9/11, is recognizing the importance of entrepreneurs and the fact that few of them have the capital and training he began with 30 years ago. To assist NYC's new entrepreneurs, in 2009 Mayor Bloomberg launched nine business incubators thoughout NYC, hosting more than 500 start-up businesses and more than 800 jobs. The incubatees have raised $39 million in private capital so far. Many are graduating from their incubators...

Green startups are also popping up all over the city, in the areas of organic produce, provenance-tracking food vendors, energy-efficiency programs and alternative-energy options. Green Spaces, a green incubator that started in Brooklyn, has cloned itself in Manhattan. It is now exporting its incubator skills, backing the Green Route Festival this Saturday in Denver...

Excerpts from comments by the Mayor and Rep. Maloney follow:

Mayor Bloomberg:

When we launched the first business incubator in 2009 to make it easier for entrepreneurs to turn their ideas into local businesses and jobs, we pledged to open more if it was successful. Now, we're identifying opportunities to expand the program even further. We want New York City to be the most welcoming city in the country for people who want to start a business.

Rep. Maloney:

I agree wholeheartedly with President Obama that Congress needs to get moving to support job creation: We need to reauthorize the cut in payroll taxes we approved in the last Congress. I'd like to commend Mayor Bloomberg on the success of New York's business incubators. This kind of innovation is one of the reasons New York is doing better than the national average.

Congratulations to the mayor and the other officials working on the incubators. Local efforts do not replace an effective and timely national jobs program. However, whatever NYC can do to encourage entrepreneurship in tech development, sustainable living and any other promising industry is a valuable contribution towards solving the job shortage and an example for other cities and states!

Full story: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-tepper-marlin/nyc-startups_b_937230.html

amNY "The Office 2.0: Havens for solo workers - Co-working spaces take off in NYC as economy explodes 9-to-5 careers"

Call it the home office away from home.

No longer satisfied with lugging a laptop to Starbucks, independent workers in New York are increasingly embracing so-called co-working spaces that offer the comforts and benefits of an office setting.

The phenomenon - an outgrowth of the Great Recession - began as a happy marriage between landlords suddenly left with lots of space to rent out, and workers caught up in job turmoil looking for a shared professional environment to reinvent their careers as freelancers or consultants.

"It forced a new bubble of entrepreneurship that caused everyone to think outside the box. This unprecedented shift created an opportunity for a new way of working," said Marissa Feinberg, co-founder of Green Spaces NYC... amNewYork visited five co-working spaces that are leading the way.

Green Spaces NYC

Where: 394 Broadway

The Angle: For the eco-friendly set

The Deal: A full-time desk is $550 a month; open space is $250 a month...

Green Spaces NYC provides a home to 80 members who embody a lifestyle of health and sustainability, environmentalist companies, non-profits and a diverse mix of independents.

You don't need a green focus to join, but you do have to share their environmental philosophy.

The facility uses Con Ed Wind Energy, kitchen utensils are made from fallen leaves, compost is turned into biofuel, and furniture is recycled and refurbished.

Joe Miller, 24, the founder of Print a Forest, a PC software company that funds reforestation efforts, said Green Spaces was the reason he moved his start-up from Detroit to New York City. 

He is also a fan of Green Spaces' weekly Idea Bounce Lunches.

"It's fantastic to be around like-minded individuals coming together to make a change," he said.

(See the image above for the rest of the article).

NEW YORK POST

"Space Odyssey - NYC Coworking Spaces, from Cool to Corporate"

By ANNA LEAH JACOBSON

Posted: 11:27 PM, May 15, 2011

As the numbers of laptop-toting city freelancers has boomed in recent years, so has the number of communal workspaces offering them an alternative to coffee shops and cramped studio apartments. They come in all stripes — from scruffy spaces where workers gather around communal tables to corporate-style concerns with luxurious workstations and receptionists.

That means there’s a desk-away-from-home to suit every taste, with a wide variety of amenities and socializing opportunities. More interested in branding workshops or showers in the bathroom? A color printer or weekly happy hours? This guide will help you navigate the waters.

Green Spaces

Best for: carbon footprint minders

This TriBeCa space is split 60/40 between dedicated desks and communal tables, but everyone here is committed to sustainability, either as a lifestyle or professionally. There are recycling bins and mismatched mugs, floods of natural light and green plants everywhere. Although the sparse, eclectic loft space is furnished with reclaimed furniture and raw wood pallets, it still feels professional, with glassed-in conference rooms. Casual and drop-in members use communal tables in the back, while regulars — whose pursuits range from supplying sustainable fish to promoting rickshaw transport — have dedicated desks. The atmosphere is calm and friendly, and there are “Idea Bounce” lunches, where members offer one another advice.

Cost: $35 a day, $250-$495 a month

Features: Fair trade coffee and tea, printer, 24/7 access

Social scene: Communal lunches, workshops, film screenings

Click here for the rest of the story.

DAILY NEWS "Green Spaces New York Connects Eco-minded Entrepreneurs"