SAN ANTONIO — A unique coworking space that recently opened in downtown San Antonio is adapting to changes over the last few years in the way people work.
Common Desk overlooks Travis Park in Travis Park Plaza at 711 Navarro Street. The space includes open coworking desks, private offices, and even a podcast studio. It also include a coffee bar, kitchen and conference rooms.
Staff members with the company say the growing coworking space industry is a response to the increased demand of hybrid or flexible work situations.
"I do see a trend of people coming back into the office, but flexible office," Katy Lloyd, Senior Community Manager at Common Desk, said.
The COVID effect
We know from Census data that many of the jobs that suddenly went remote in the early months of the pandemic stayed remote. In 2019, San Antonio's workforce was about 4.8 percent remote. By 2022, the number was 14.8 percent, even though most COVID restrictions had lifted by that point.
Since then, trend-watchers noticed a couple of things. First, that companies wanted their employees to return to the office in some capacity. Early in 2024, Boeing and UPS said they wanted workers back in the office five days a week. IBM recently said managers have to be back in the office at least three days a week.
"CEO’s and CFO’s want their teams back in to build that community and boost that morale, so whenever I am on the phone with people, and talking about Common Desk, I’m like, this would be the perfect place to transition your team," Lloyd said. "We have an option for if people only want to come Tuesdays, Thursdays, and the rest of their team wants to come in Mondays, Wednesdays...we've seen that happen."
The second thing is that many workers across the country have also experienced burnout and disengagement from remote work. A 2023 Pew Research survey showed that younger workers in particular were more likely to experience these things and were more likely to embrace hybrid work situations.
"Why not make it fun? That is the dream behind Common Desk," Lloyd added. "Just making it energizing, making it interactive, making it fun to come work with different events, speciality coffees and ways that we can connect with the people around us."
Lloyd says one of their most popular options is the Day Pass, starting at just $25, and including free coffee. She says it is great for people spending the day in San Antonio in between flights or remote workers who want to get out of the house once in a while.
Staking a claim in downtown SA
Like in cities across the United States, downtown San Antonio experienced a surge in office vacancies since the pandemic. Vacancies across the city hit an all-time high at 18.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2023, according to the San Antonio Express News.
With the shift in some workers to remote and hybrid situations, some office buildings downtown are being converted to apartments and hotels. Those include the Tower Life building, the Travis building and CPS Energy's former headquarters on Navarro Street. Some long-standing downtown restaurants also recently closed, like Mexican Manhattan and Rio Rio Cantina.
Despite that, Common Desk's staff members see it as a place to grow their services.
"San Antonio was brought to us because our real estate team said they were getting the most requests for Common Desk in San Antonio. because coworking is not super popular here," Lloyd said.
Jesse Cazares, the Community Lead for Common Desk, is from the Alamo City. He believes Common Desk has a place in the downtown area.
"With San Antonio and its growth and kind of its reimagining of what San Antonio looks like, we really want to bring those people back downtown and make downtown the hub of community, collaboration, business," Cazarez said.
With prime real estate along Travis Park, its close to many iconic locations.
"We are just steps away from the River Walk. Downtown is not just a tourist destination, it is for residents to come down and enjoy, to work, play and live," Cazares said. "Just as San Antonians have done for over 300 years in the heart of downtown, where you have business, commerce, community, at Common Desk, we are really wanting to bring that back down to the core of the city."