When LaunchPad Coworking opens, we’ll be the first official coworking space in Austin. In the meanwhile, independent workers — those who work alone and those who join together through Jelly or other informal groups — find community spaces in a catch is as catch can fashion. Which often means they gather in cafés around town, of which there are plenty, in all flavors from informal and grungy to sleek and stylized.
Walk into any coffee shop and you see it — plenty of people flying solo, fully engaged with their laptops and cell phones and iPods, seemingly oblivious to those around them. I do this myself, often enough, angling for conversation with baristas when the need to feel non-isolated strikes me.
I was curious how coffee shop owners view the growing trend for folks to use their spaces as casual offices—good for business, bad for business? Joshua Bingaman, who owns Progress Coffee with his wife, Sarah, agreed to sit down and chat with me about how he views his space, his patrons, and changes that have occurred in the four years since he opened up a groovy place inside what once was a dilapidated East side warehouse in Austin. Interestingly, he’s not hugely concerned with providing all WiFi all the time. In fact, there are some days he’d prefer to be without it.
Spike Gillespie: How did you get started?
Joshua Bingaman: My wife and I moved here from San Francisco where I’d had a retail shoe and clothes store. I wasn’t planning on opening a café. We kept going to cafes in Austin that had more of a darker, danker feel, a little musty. That’s fine — to each his own — but in San Francisco there were some cleaner, classier places that weren’t overly hipster. We were wondering where could find a place like that to go pre and post movie and couldn’t find it. I fell in love with the east side and intentionally found a dilapidated warehouse to build out. I wanted to lean less toward gentrification and more toward development. I wanted to create something like Dean and Deluca meets Austin meets San Francisco with a little New York City thrown in. I wanted to go organic and fair trade but not charge extra or be in anyone’s face about it. Originally I knew it would take people a second to realize we were modeling after a European concept — we used to have one offering per day from local farms. We didn’t do [regular] coffee, we did Americanos. People were like “Where are the breakfast tacos?” They didn’t catch the vision. We had to break some peoples’ habits of going to Wendy’s. We started to introduce them to more gourmet options — turkey and local jam with local mixed greens instead of Schlotsky’s, cheese plates and nice wines.
Spike: What was your clientele like and how has it changed?
Joshua: A lot were coming in from offices, there were some business meetings. I thought I really need to reach out to the community. The wireless thing we didn’t do in the beginning. I wanted Progress to be a place where people came and communed and had espressos and wine. My wife and I had spent time in places in Europe where they had one beer on tap, one wine in a carafe, you can get an espresso and a cheese plate of local cheese. We thought that was so cool. It didn’t work.
So we got wireless and coffee but we still wanted to keep the concept and the character of the place. We’ve seen an increase in computers and people working in here. It’s hard when we have lunch or brunch rush and one person is taking a four-seater table for four hours with one cup of coffee. You’re hardly making any markup. We’d have a line out the door and all of the tables were full. We had to unplug the router. It’s been an issue.
The more Progress is well known, the more students come in. We’ve intentionally not sought them out but we’re cool with it when they come in and buy lunch. And there are three clients we have, I can name their names, they come in seven days a week, get coffee and breakfast work through lunch, buy lunch, buy beer at happy hour. Is it their office? Yes. Are they supporting the business? Yes.
Spike: So offering wireless is a liability?
Joshua: We’ve thought of changing the password hourly or daily or charging for the connection. What I do like [about offering wireless] is the creativity from people making deals here, like the realtors having access and looking at stuff online. I do want people here so [the independent workers on laptops] are a cushion or a backdrop. But when there’s a band playing and there’s 5 or 6 customers on laptops — we aren’t here as workspace then. When weekday lunch really picked up we were turning the wireless off from 12:30 to 1:30. There was a reaction because some people want to come in and work through lunch so I had to bend — even my manager, when he comes down and has a meeting, needs to get online. Wireless is a blessing and a curse.
Spike: What do you think about coworking spaces?
Joshua: It’s interesting what LaunchPad is doing. I’ve had a few people approach me about the space next door — I have 3,000 square feet. I like the concept because it might detract some of the people like the guy who gets one iced coffee, sits for eight hours and takes up the most bandwidth.
I went to a café the other morning, a place I love. There were 13 tables, 26 chairs and 18 people on laptops. The only thing I heard in the whole café was the espresso machine. I felt like putting a 9mm in my brain. There’s a community of people with a desire for relationships — I walk through and look at the screens. I felt like going around and closing their laptops and being like Jesus and saying “Hey let me introduce you to the other people.” My wife and I were in Germany over Christmas in a really small café. People were shoulder-to-shoulder and back-to-back having their beer and their cheese. The talk and ambience was deafening. Community was vibrant and exuberant and growing.
I experience that and want that here and come in sometimes and there are fifteen people on laptops and it’s sad. I am starting to not fight it but I want to go backwards. I almost want to go for old school. We want names of patrons known, orders known, hugs given. You can’t force that but you can create the setting for it. Still, you’ve got to bend with the times — it’s a struggle. Even with our router off, there are eighteen routers within a hundred yards.
Photo by John Anderson/Austin Chronicle
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15 responses so far ↓
1 dirty_snowflake // Apr 24, 2008 at 10:19 pm
People have all different kinds of communications styles. I do not in any way, shape, or form want random people to give me hugs. That crosses so many boundaries for me. And when I go into a coffee shop, I don’t want random people to come up and talk to me. I want to have my coffee, read my book , work on my laptop, etc. I’m not there for conversation. I want to be left alone in public spaces. If I wanted to get to know everyone and start conversations, I’d go to a party.
In this increasingly crowded world privacy is a commodity. The last thing I want is for every chatty cathy in the world (barista or patron) to feel free to come up and infringe upon my personal space.
Different strokes for different folks.
2 David Giesberg // Apr 24, 2008 at 10:27 pm
Really interesting interview, very thought-provoking.
Personally, I like the idea of turning wi-fi off during peak times (or even just throttling bandwidth waaaay down). What I want to do at a coffeehouse depends on the time of day I’m there, usually it is social in the evenings and working early in the morning. Wifi is a great way for coffeehouses to draw people in on off-peak hours, when the place would be dead otherwise, but I totally understand not wanting people to be parked there taking up space and eating into their (small) margins.
3 Julie Gomoll // Apr 24, 2008 at 10:31 pm
As we explore the needs and desires of people interested in coworking, it’s clear there are opposing needs.
Some people feel isolated, and want the community and opportunities for collaboration. I fall into this category.
Others are working independently and struggling with too many distractions - they want to go somewhere where they can do their thing without interruptions.
It’s quite a challenge designing a place to accommodate both ends of the spectrum. The good new is I think more places will be opening that strive to cater to all sorts of different needs.
What do you think about Joshua’s decision to unplug the wifi during the lunch rush?
4 Jenn Deering Davis // Apr 24, 2008 at 10:40 pm
I agree with Joshua. I work from home and frequently find myself going a little stir crazy and needing the company of others, so I go to a coffee shop. Sure, I’m there to work, but I’m also open to interaction and community. I love it when the barista remembers me, and talks with me about my life. I can always make coffee at home; I go to coffee shops and public places to be around other people. When I need serious work time for concentrating on creative tasks, I can come back to my home office. Though I am a huge proponent of wifi and all things high-tech, I still think the old school, European model Joshua talks about is just as important.
5 dirty_snowflake // Apr 24, 2008 at 10:40 pm
I’ve worked in lots of restaurants, so I understand the frustration of “campers” taking up valuable table real estate that could be used making money, but unplugging the wireless during high peak hours will just make me not patronize that coffee shop at all. I get why he’s doing it, but that just means he loses a customer in me. I’ll go down the street to Cafe Mundi where I can have both wireless and a sense of privacy.
6 Todd Sundsted // Apr 24, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Great article! I kind of wish our barista’s would turn wi-fi off every hour and not turn it on again until we all introduced ourselves to the person sitting next to us.
AKA Bandit
7 Making Progress // Apr 24, 2008 at 11:30 pm
[…] Spike Gillespie published an entertaining and interesting post on Making ProgressSee below for a small excerpt of the post: […]
8 Cesar Torres // Apr 25, 2008 at 1:31 am
Progress is hands down my favorite coffee shop in all of Austin. I’ve been going there for a while now (I’d go there to study while I was at UT). I’ve personally seen people get out of line and leave, so I can see how Joshua wants to maximize the number of people that can sit down and enjoy his space.
I think it’s fine if the wi-fi gets turned off at Progress during certain hours, but I think it should be made very apparent that it’s happening—transparency is key, but they shouldn’t hide it or lie about it. If I knew that I couldn’t have my notebook out during certain times, I would just go eat somewhere else during lunchtime, but still try to make it to Progress earlier in the morning or later in the afternoon if I wanted to get work done while eating/drinking coffee. Wi-fi isn’t a necessity at a coffee shop or any other place of business for that matter; no one HAS to have wi-fi at their coffee shop. I think Austinites take for granted the coverage of free wi-fi in the city (a blessing and a curse). Scarcity makes you appreciate things more, right?
PS: I miss the stools in the back left corner, which I always tried to use even if the tables were available to not take up space. How can you facilitate co-mingling between patrons?
9 Brian Massey // Apr 25, 2008 at 10:08 am
Every challenge is an opportunity.
I think “campers” would love having a separate “working” section vs. a “no working” area which benefits the business or waiters.
I think having a coffee club program of $8-10 per month (discounted coffee) would provide a guaranteed stream of income on which to build a loyal base.
If “campers” aren’t buying, it’s because you’re not offering what they want. Progress has a great menu and I spend more when I go there than places with only baked goods.
10 Julie Gomoll // Apr 25, 2008 at 10:58 am
I’m glad to see Joshua getting support for unplugging the wifi. Coffee shop margins are razor thin - it’s got to be tough to deal with campers nursing an iced tea all day.
I agree with you, Cesar - he should be up front about it.
11 spike // Apr 25, 2008 at 12:43 pm
I’m pretty sure they *do* let customers know, at least sometimes, that the router is off. When I went in to interview Joshua, I couldn’t connect to a Progress router. The thing is, there’s a free COA connection that reaches into the space, so I was able to use that. I’ll confirm with Joshua if he sometimes/always alerts customers and let you know what I find out.
12 Friday Link Post: Hardy Heron Edition | david giesberg dot com // Apr 25, 2008 at 2:01 pm
[…] Making Progress Launchpad Coworking A cool interview with the owner of Progress Coffee in Austin, talking about computer users in coffee shops and the vibe that they try to create So we got wireless and coffee but we still wanted to keep the concept and the character of the place. We’ve seen an increase in computers and people working in here. It’s hard when we have lunch or brunch rush and one person is taking a four-seater table for four hours with one cup of coffee. You’re hardly making any markup. We’d have a line out the door and all of the tables were full. We had to unplug the router. It’s been an issue. […]
13 john erik // Apr 26, 2008 at 1:16 pm
Great interview, Spike. I like the way Joshua thinks/talks.
14 Knoxville’s coworking zeitgeist : KnoxvilleTalks.com // May 1, 2008 at 11:16 am
[…] the official blogger for Austin’s active coworking community is ex-Knoxvillian Spke Gillespie. show us some love!SubscribeBlogmarksDiggdel.icio.usStumbleUpon May 1st, […]
15 Where is Austin’s Startup District? // May 20, 2008 at 3:20 pm
[…] just a coworking space of professionals who would normally be working out of the home office or the coffee shop. These guys want to form Austin’s own Startup District: a place for entrepreneurs and […]
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