« March 11, 2007 - March 17, 2007 | Main | March 25, 2007 - March 31, 2007 »

March 23, 2007

Dymun+Company, Pittsburgh

What are cool space companies looking for?

Continuing yesterday's entry on the Cool Spaces Report, what are the people behind the relocating companies saying they prioritize?

The single most important relocation factors in the report are:
1. Specific location: 40%
2. Price: 19%
3. Proximity to homes upper management/workforce: 15%

As they say in real estate, location, location, location. The specific location is typically associated with a cool neighborhood to begin with, and the upper management/workforce will be leaning the same way. If your city is lacking in these kind of places, it probably has brain drain difficulties.

The most desirable building characteristics are:
1. Primarily lit with natural lighting
2. Has one or more restaurants within a 5-10 minute walk
3. A sidewalk in front of the building
4. Interesting architectural features

As the CEO of one of the companies stated, “Our office in the Strip District is so much cooler than our former space in the suburbs. The building is so flexible and has a good mix of tenants. Plus, it’s exciting that it’s not just a nine-to-five building; people are coming and going all day.”

Image: Dynum + Company, Pittsburgh

Posted by Neil | Link to Article | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 22, 2007

Cool Deals Report

If your business is looking for cool space...

You ought to look at the newly published Cool Deals Report: Capturing the New Market in Urban Commercial Real Estate, "to learn what the most innovative companies want in an office and how urban and walkable communities provide it."

If you're in Pittsburgh, you should call the publisher of the report, Cool Space Locator, a nonprofit commercial real estate service that seeks out cool space for small and growing businesses, with cool space defined as "commercial real estate in walkable urban neighborhoods, where sidewalks and a traditional street grid promote pedestrian travel and urban density."

Based on their database of 500 Pittsburgh companies seeking 'cool space', here are a couple of findings from their report based on businesses they've placed:

- The businesses with the most placements are: Communications, Advertising/Marketing/Media and Information Technology.
- 92% of all companies were previously in urban settings
- 40% were female-owned (national average is 28%)
- 94% leased
- Typical employment size: 3-5 persons, overall cool space market
- Average office size: 1865 sf, overall cool space market

Posted by Neil | Link to Article | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 21, 2007

Mississippi Pizza Pub, Portland OR

Cool town creative businesses coping with gentrification

The question for creative businesses is not if a cool place becomes popular and gentrified, but what to do when it is.

One answer is to join an artists cooperative and work with a group like Artspace that provides such attainable housing.

Another is to establish your own cooperative of sorts via a beta community, where you decide with a group what kinds of residential and commercial tenants to have, along the same lines as artist cooperatives do.

The best individual answer for your business is to own your space, but if you can't, then be ready to scale your business as your rent increases. That's what the Mississippi Pizza Pub did as its Portland OR neighborhood gentrified around it. From an Oregonian interview with the owner:

"When he opened his now-popular nightspot in 2001, the street was mostly "hookers and drug dealers." Now it's a thriving neighborhood, full of restaurants, coffee shops, a garden store and a brewpub. "It's a balance," [the owner, Philip Stanton] said. "You want an area to change enough to make it safe, but you can't stop it when you want it to. You lose affordability, but the advantage is that you create a village."

In the same article, read about businesses that couldn't scale and had to move cross country.

El Gray>

Posted by Neil | Link to Article | Comments (0) | TrackBack

March 20, 2007

Concert in Outer Mongolia

'Crowd Clout' coming to cool towns?

We all know people are organizing online to get what they want. However, because people are now doing it with such ease, speed and unprecedented influence, our friends at Trendwatching felt it deserved a unique distinction:

Crowd Clout: “Online co-buying consumers revealing their purchasing intentions to make the most of their investments. These efforts target a specific cause, be it political, civic or commercial, aimed at everything from bringing down politicians to forcing suppliers to fork over discounts.”

Some examples included in the Trendwatching report:
- Music lovers investing in bands to finance studio recordings before/if they hit it big,
- Real estate services connecting people who have cool places (but not yet for sale) with people looking to buy
- Gadget aficionados co-designing, co-investing in future electronics (see story here)
- Buyers aggregating their purchasing power to buy things at lower prices

Stay tuned, because in a week or two you'll hear about some crowd clout efforts to establish new cool town destinations, from a new organic cafe/bar/coffeehouse to renovating a 55,000 warehouse into an arts and music live-work community.

Posted by Neil | Link to Article | Comments (1) | TrackBack

March 19, 2007

Cafe in the U District, Seattle

'America's Next Hot Neighborhoods'

You've just seen the study that documents the connection between rising home values and the bohemian index, so what are some examples of such neighborhoods?

BusinessWeek provides a pretty good list (with the help of Zillow) in their recently published, America's Next Hot Neighborhoods.

Their city neighborhoods with the fastest rising home values yet still affordable are:

Boston: Dorchester, Mount Bowdoin, Grove Hall
Chicago: East Garfield Park, Cicero, Lower West Side
Denver: Civic Center, Skyland, Sandown
Los Angeles: Pico Union, Jefferson Park, Mid-City
Miami: Little River, Lemon City, Model City
New York: Kingsbridge Heights, The Bronx; Bergen Beach; Downtown Flushing
Phoenix: Cashion, Central City, Villa Monte Vista
San Francisco: Mission Bay, Tanforan, Hunter's Point
Seattle: University District, Georgetown, Dunlap
St. Louis: Tiffany, Tower Grove, Benton Park

They provide four indicators for predicting which neighborhoods will appreciate:

1. Access to mass transit.
2. Potential for a thriving neighborhood commercial center (ie main street).
3. Zoning that allows new condos, apartments.
4. Signs of investment.

...and based on the descriptions of these neighborhoods, a diverse population.

Image source: freedryk

Posted by Neil | Link to Article | Comments (0) | TrackBack