#17 "We pivoted our coworking business model to offer Com-PR services" - Seed Factory (Brussels)

Edouard Cambier is the founder of Seed Factory, a Flex Workspace and Coworking space operating in Brussels since the early 2000's. Edouard is also the president of the Belgian Workspace Association (BWA), which gathers more than 200 Belgian coworking and flex workspace members.
Seed Factory pivoted immediately after the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak. The space, which normally hosts more than 150 people, created it's own PR and news agency for its members and started a communication campaign both on mainstream local media as well as on social networks. Seed Factory also engaged with local organic food producers and created its own local market on the parking lots.
As of early June 2020, one third of the tenants are back in the walls.
Leads are coming in again. But the average profile is changing.
"We were focused on communication and media professions and agencies. this was our ecosystem and community. Nowadays, we start to receive demands from corporations. They are considering to change their workspace stock management strategy. We really start to see it", observes Edouard Cambier.
As the president of the BWA, he also expects the big shift to take place.
The BWA sees 4 main categories of coworking/flex spaces : 1 quartile very profitable and automated, located in the Industry parks of suburban Belgium, where services and catering is seldom. Personal connections are sometimes weak but many employees in the area join and create the circulation of people. The 2nd quartile is more community based with very professional services, and minimum 2000 m2 of surface. It's slightly less profitable but the business is successful and the operations good enough.
The 3rd and 4th quartiles is made out of too small spaces, not well enough managed or capitalized, with often a lot of public funding. They might play a role but there is a lot of room for optimization and improvement, says the BWA's president.
The Belgian coworking market is still very fragmented, with a lot of very small players. Edouard Cambier expects a wave of consolidation.