Desks? Check. Meeting rooms? Check. Meditation room?
…Check?
Every coworking space needs the essentials. Now, they need a little bit more than that too. Members need community, networking opportunities, and a wide array of amenities to entice them to stay at a coworking space.
In this article, we’ll share with you 15 ideas for unique coworking amenities that you can add to your space, from photography studios to catered lunches. We’ll also share with you examples of these amenities in practice, featuring 15 Optix clients.
Use this as inspiration when building out your own coworking amenity offerings in your space
Adding a gym to your coworking space can be a great way to support the health and well-being of your members if you have the space for it.
Fitness facilities range from a few spin bikes and a yoga room to a thousand sq ft facility with state-of-the-art equipment. While a gym may be a higher upfront cost to create and maintain, you’ll be able to charge a premium for your offering and bundle it with your other coworking memberships.
Check out this space: Optix client, Colab coworking, in Oregon offers an on-site gym and showers included with some of their membership plans. Members can work out before or after working in the space and are given a 24/7 keycard to the facility.
Eco-friendly coworking spaces are not something new, however, for spaces that are trying to cultivate community and innovation around urban challenges and sustainable agriculture, and/or for spaces that want to create a unique environment for events and gatherings, a greenhouse is a great amenity that you could consider adding to your coworking space.
Check out this space: Optix client, Enterspace, based in Norway, is a coworking and event space that includes a greenhouse on-site for members to be able to experiment, collaborate and create sustainable solutions to urban challenges.
Coworking spaces for parents are rising in popularity across North America. Offering childcare in your coworking space can help you:
There’s a lot to learn before bringing child care into your coworking space. If you’re interested in learning more, we recommend checking out our complete guide to coworking and childcare.
Check out this space: Optix client, The New Havens, is a coworking space offering childcare to their members at an additional cost. Their childcare facility is on-site and is available on a monthly basis for children aged 3 months to 4 years old.
Having a quiet space for members to decompress from their work day can be a nice way to support the physical and mental health of your members. You can create a yoga or meditation room by:
Check out this space: Optix client, The Urban Hive, is the largest coworking space in Sacramento. They offer their members access to a variety of wellness-centered amenities including access to a meditation room, yoga, and massages on-site.
Coffee is a staple in every coworking space and is a popular drink choice for many busy entrepreneurs. You can enhance your coffee offering by bringing a cafe into your coworking space.
There are many different ways to integrate coworking and cafes. Some spaces choose to have their cafe on-site, on another level of the same building, or next door. In these cases, the cafe is owned and operated by the coworking space, so it can be quite a heavy lift.
If you’re not ready to run a restaurant, you can consider partnering with a local cafe and offering a discount to your members as a member perk.
Check out this space: Optix client, The Collective by Goosecup, is a modern coworking space located directly above Goosecup, a coffee shop, and cafe. Members get access to complimentary drip coffee from the cafe, and can easily head downstairs whenever they need a caffeine (or snack) fix.
Providing outdoor work areas can be a nice way of giving your member’s a break from their usual workday routine, especially if you live in a warm and sunny area.
When setting up your outdoor space, you’ll want to:
Check out this space: Optix client, Lifestyle Communities, is a large coworking space redefining work-life balance. They offer an elaborate outdoor lounge area attached to an open-air patio for members to use at their leisure.
Offering complimentary coffee and tea is considered standard practice now for coworking spaces.
However, you can take this one step further by offering daily catered lunches that members can order ahead of time. These lunches can either be made in-house by a chef or catered by a local company, depending on the resources you have available to you.
Check out this space: Optix client, Highland City Club, is a social club and coworking space in Boulder, Colorado. They offer a daily meal to their members made from local and seasonal ingredients.
They’ve offered meals like Red chile braise pork posole and Old bay spiced walleye for members to reserve and purchase each day. All meals can be ordered exclusively through their white-labeled coworking app, to make it even easier for members to purchase them.
Podcasting has been gaining traction for years, and coworking spaces are adjusting their offerings to keep up with demand.
A coworking amenity you may want to consider offering in your space is a podcasting studio. These typically come with professional podcasting equipment and noise insulation, and may even contain videography equipment for filming podcasts.
The benefit of these studios for members is they’re typically far less than if they were to buy all of the equipment on their own. You’ll benefit from the additional revenue stream.
Check out this space: Optix client, Recordical, is a coworking space specifically for podcasters and other audio creators that offers state-of-the-art audio equipment to their members.
Their goal is to make podcasting and audio recording accessible for all through their inclusive membership offerings.
Photo studios are typically bright, open spaces with professional photography equipment and lighting. They can be appealing for:
Coworking spaces for creatives are popular due to the large number of freelance artists that choose to work out of shared spaces. If you have a lot of members working in the creative industry, it’s worth considering whether or not they would benefit from a studio space.
Check out this space: Optix client, Supply, is a coworking space in Pennsylvania. They have a 900 sq ft photography studio that contains white walls and floor, natural light, and modern furniture that members can rent out and use.
Having storage on-site can be a nice add-on to offer your members. This could be beneficial for those who are traveling for work, going somewhere after the workday (ie. a gym bag for the gym), or who are running their own business and need a place to store physical inventory.
Some spaces charge their members an additional fee for the use of a locker, while others choose to absorb the cost of the locker into a membership plan and raise the base cost.
Check out this space: Optix client, Scout Workshop, offers their members lockers and storage rentals. These are considered an upgrade to their regular membership plans and can be added on as needed.
One interesting amenity to explore in your coworking space is a pop-up retail shop. Here are a few examples of how this could work:
You can sell these items through a coworking app like Optix using the Marketplace feature so members can easily pay for items, without any cash exchanging hands.
Check out this space: Optix client, ECOMsquare, is a coworking space specifically for those in the e-commerce industry. They offer a pop-up retail shop where members can showcase their new products and get valuable market research on ways they can improve it.
Everybody loves their pets. Allowing members to bring their pets into the space, and offering amenities just for them can be a differentiating factor to attract pet lovers.
Before opening your space up to animals, you’ll want to create house rules that cover all your bases. It should include information about what kind of animals are allowed into the space, who is responsible for furniture that may be damaged, and what happens if an animal misbehaves.
Check out this space: Optix client, Fractal Workspace, is a boutique office and social space in Canada. They welcome dogs in their space and encourage their members to bring in their four-legged friends.
Bring work and play together in one space by offering day spa treatments to your members. This can include:
It can be nice to offer a Registered Massage Therapist (RMT) on-site to your members or to book an RMT to come in a couple of times a week so members can get the benefits of body relaxation at the comfort of their desks.
Check out this space: Optix client, Flockd, is a wellness-oriented coworking space in Australia. They offer day spa treatments to help their members relax and unwind, including pedicures and in-office chair massages.
Happy hours and evening open houses are popular community-building tactics for coworking spaces. Elevate your regular coworking events by bringing a licensed bar into your space.
While it’s great to have for your own events, it’s a particularly unique selling point when it comes to renting your space for events after-hours. If you’re interested in using space rental to drive revenue, then it may be worth considering the cost of having a bar on-site.
Check out this space: Optix client, Urban Hub, has a fully licensed bar on-site, as well as a cafe with barista-made coffee. They offer catered buffets and unique wine pairings to members who book the space for events.
Are you located in a major metropolitan city with many commuters coming in and out of your space?
Consider offering internal bike racks and bike storage for them to store their bike during the day. While it may seem small, many members appreciate being able to keep their bike nearby – without having to worry about it getting damaged by the weather or misplaced.
Check out this space: Optix client, Emporium Creative Hub, is a unique space tailored to creatives in Australia. They offer their members internal bike racks where they can hang their bikes for the day while at work, safe and out of harm’s way.
If you want to build a thriving community and set yourself apart from other spaces in the market, consider offering unique and differentiated coworking amenities to your members.
Many of the coworking amenities above can be made easier through the use of a coworking app like Optix, from using it to manage payments in your Marketplace to booking a massage for the afternoon with Resources.
To learn more about Optix can help your business, book a demo today.
