A Guelph man is looking to create a support system for people who work alone with the launch of a pop-up coworking space.
Brydon Gilliss opened Guelph’s first coworking space about 15 years ago on Woolwich Street. It's a concept that involves people from different companies sharing an office space for cost savings and camaraderie.
“I was running a technology team for a software product. Originally, it was just for us, but we only had about 10 people, and had enough room for more.”
They invited a few people from outside their team to work in the space for free. When his business shut down, he extended that invite further.
“When that business I was running failed, I wanted to try to keep the community that we had started in the building, so I flipped it around and officially started a coworking business.”
The building –a converted two-storey house – had about 20 full-time desks with a small boardroom that could hold 10 to 15 people, as well as a little kitchen area.
He ran the physical space for about 10 years, until the pandemic shut it down. But even before that, he had been “wrestling with this feeling that the physical building was holding back the community a little bit.”
Now, he’s looking at a new project: a pop-up coworking space out of various locations in Guelph, like Royal City Brewing.
“Working independently shouldn't mean working alone. Whether you're remote working, freelancing, or building something new, you need the right people around you. Not just for support, but for those unexpected conversations that lead to breakthroughs.”
It doesn’t quite have a name yet, but it’s essentially a coworking space that’s not tied in with the real-estate model, which requires you to “put butts in seats and sell real estate space."
He wanted to know what the concept would look like if that aspect was removed entirely, to focus more on the community aspect rather than a mortgage or lease.
“And then the other side of that is realizing that there are a lot of really interesting spaces like this, which are idle during the day, but would benefit and be interested in having people come in and activate the space,” he said.
“A lot has changed in the world since we closed the doors of our physical building in March 2020,” he wrote. “All these changes have me feeling that we need more communities rather than less. It seems we have more people working by themselves today than ever before.”
And while working from home can be exciting and beneficial for some, it can also have drawbacks.
“There’s a potentially negative side of things that people have to be aware of, like loneliness, not being able to talk to somebody (about work),” he said. “I could talk to my wife and kids all day long about work, but it’s exhausting for them.”
Right now it's free for people to sign up, though he said that could potentially change down the road if need be to sustain it (he noted it is not and was never about the money; it’s not intended to be a business).
He’s partnered with Royal City Brewing to use the space during the day once every two weeks. Gilliss said the brewery has been a big support in the early stages.
“We are very happy to host, very happy to be tied into the community and the entrepreneurial community,” said Royal City Brewing co-owner Cam Fryer.
“It’s a really great use of space. We like to have the space open to the community, and this is an excellent application of what we’re trying to do,” he said.
About four sessions in, Gilliss said there have been about 40 to 50 people showing up in total.
As the sessions start to get more popular, he expects to add more dates at Royal City Brewing and other locations around the city, and to launch an additional online space so people can keep in touch asynchronously.
The next pop-up session is on Feb. 12 at Royal City Brewing. Interested workers can sign up for future sessions by joining the email list.
"This isn't about another networking group or coworking space. This is about building the support system we all need to succeed," he wrote.