– This office is really impressive, but it seems you don’t have much parking lots. Or BJ48 they have been designed according to the European trends that more and more people prefer public transport and bicycle use?
– The number of parking lots is limited; everyone wants one for himself, but no one wants to pay for it. It seems to me that the situation resolves itself in practice: As a result of the increasing traffic parking fees rise, now you have to pay €100/month/vehicle. We have a good relationship with the neighboring underground car parks, and many of our clients go for ticket for a month. But then they realized that this does not make much sense. On the "last mile" in the city center – a few kilometers before the goal – you simply can’t avoid traffic jam. And this happens twice a day, once upon arrival and once at the end of the work, when you're heading home. All our office has excellent public transport; I personally only use bicycle and metro in town.
– Ok, let's say that this convinced me. But what about the basic objection that the serviced office worth only short-term? Is this business solid?
– The shortest period you may move to our place is four weeks, but this is only a theoretical possibility. Theoretical, because this has not happened yet: 80% of our partners stay for a year or longer. Our NEW WORK Office solutions - whether we talk about R70, or B52, Anker or Budaörs or even BJ48 - are different in styles and design, but the essence is the same: We offer transparent, simple, fast and highly efficient solutions. If you sign a contract with us today, you can work within 24 hours at your own desk. In a working environment where everything works properly and you can focus on you core business. There is a coffee machine in the kitchen, a high-bandwidth WLAN is operating, cleaning lady comes in the evening, and service list is to be continued. What is important: it is optional; the individual services are free to choose.
– Yes, but it has a price. A startup - which has a total assets of a laptop and a world-saving idea - seldom able to pay for a service of comfort.
– We have many start-ups as tenants; they are developing apps in the next office too. Do you know why? What we offer is a premium service that pays off. Start-ups are exactly here because of our flexibility: if a small entrepreneur rents a traditional office, first need to wait until it is carpeted, cabled, furnished, etc. As I mentioned, we are ready: you can move in within a day. If the tenant requests, we can bring his/her belongings, existing office equipment to our place. You do not have to invest in an office, and we do not have any 50-page lease agreement. Only a few pages, built modularly, easy to interpret agreements what we close, no fine print. In a traditional office lease contract it takes months as the two parties' lawyers clarifying all the details. If a start-up company needs 250 nm, we provide it. If they are expanding, we adapt to it. If business plan does not work, we reduce the leased space. You don’t have to sign a 2-3-5 years contract, no breach of contract, if someone moves out. Of course there is a limit where serviced office solution are no longer worth, but I think that this is the future model of office business. Due to the digitization, working environment is changing rapidly, so-called third place solutions gaining market share.
– What do you mean?
– A third place office is beyond home office and the classic office. This is the place of next generation. Starbucks offered free WLAN at cafés, and more and more people held their business meetings there. Today, it is an ordinary issue, but if someone would have said 20 years ago to his boss that "going to the café to work," he wouldn’t make any good impression. Due to the digitization, we are less stationary. With mobile internet you can work everywhere. I think even our lawyers (tenants) have no fax machines any longer.
– If no place is needed, why should I rent a place at your BJ48 or Anker?
– A place is needed, people want to communicate and network. We organize inspiring morning meetings. Beside the social side we have a stable, high-bandwidth network and uninterruptible power supply. We lease office space to Lawyers, Accountants even to the European Investment Bank; our bug-proof conference room meets his standards as well. We can assist in accounting, home cleaning and we also have a concierge service. The range of services is quite long, but the use of them is absolutely optional. Our tenants can use 100 percent of working time for a much more important issue: focusing on business success.
– Concierge? Like in a hotel, getting theater tickets for the evening?
– Exactly, and we're close to the point. We know several type of management in real estate: there is asset management, property management and facility management, but we have never heard about hospitality. We know this from care centers and hotel industry, and this makes us different to our competitors. We give to our clients tailored suits. If they gain weight, we adjust the suit to make him/her satisfied. If he/she loses weight, we can figure out a nice solution. Request for references? Ask some of our tenants: the lawyer, the auditor or the IT professional.
– Who are your tenants?
– BJ47 is nearby to financial district, mainly preferred by the above-mentioned profile tenants. Anker is more hipster character, a lot of young start-up works there, even a hat maker lady found her place to work in. At B52 and R70 is occupied by government agencies too, working with hundreds of people. Our houses are not uniformed: we always listen to the district and the house. We combine the location and the product, at the end of the day everyone will find their own calculations, and the client can say: Yes, this is me, this is my office. Just think of the success of new wave companies like Uber, Airbnb, Tesla, Cisco. Can you imagine that the future trend setters wait for months until their office is ready to use? We have to adapt to the latest trends in the real estate business; otherwise our business model falls apart. Small and medium businesses want flexible solutions, in order to be able to deal with their core business, instead of ordering suitable office equipment. In fact, with the exception of one-person businesses we can serve everyone: we recommend them a single chair co-working office.
– Now you have five centers? What are your plans?
– Based on today's state of the market I believe that by the end of 2017 we are going to have 10 centers in Budapest. It means approx. 25 thousand square meters, but it is a moving target: as the market requires, we can respond. Flexible, as well as our tenants do.
Rozsnyai Gábor - irodakereso.info
