The Phenomenon of Flex Space Office in Poland

If you are an entrepreneur who is looking for an adjustable and conveniently located space to start or develop a business, it is time to become familiar with a notion of flex space. As you can easily guess flex space is a short for a flexible space, which is, nowadays, a very popular trend among office tenants. Its popularity is not groundless. As the name suggests flex space is a single space that is useful for a variety of purposes and can be modified to suit tenant’s needs. Nevertheless, it is not a space for everyone but if you want to save money it would be  wise of you to put it on your list of things to invest in. However, it is mostly situated on a ground floor with no elevator or any special amenities. Hence, you could think that mainly economic factors make a flex space office so tempting, but there are many more advantages of it.  

The first worth – mentioning advantage is a common space. Flex space offices provides businesses with the opportunities to have all of their employees under one roof. So that the space is shared and the communication is maximized. Another big plus of such a common sharing is customization. This is when you can adjust your space to your needs. You might also do it to a traditional office space but you have to have in mind that adapting and reshaping a traditional office space is quite expensive and rarely pays off. The third advantage of  flex space office is its higher ceiling height. While conventional offices spaces reach height of 2,5 – 3,5 meters, flex space usually allows for a really spacious feel (in many cases from 3 to even 5 meters high). In some cases the height of ceiling reaches up to 7 meters high allowing the voices or noises to travel much higher around an office. Such a high ceiling allows to transform an office space into, for instance, a warehouse or vice versa whenever it is needed. The last argument to convince someone to rent a flex space is economics because flex space offices are often valued at lower costs than traditional office buildings. You pay lower realty taxes due to the lack of amenities such as elevators, convenience stores,  separate lobby areas or hallways. This also means that you pay lower gross up costs so that the square footage you use is literally your rentable square footage. 

Taking all the above mentioned advantages into consideration it is not surprising that the concept of flex space office has been quickly spread worldwide. Among European countries that adopted it with success is Poland. According to statistics Poland is ranked as the ninth provider of flex space offices in Europe with Warsaw as the lead city. Last year the capital city of Poland reported the largest grow in flex space leaving behind Amsterdam, Paris or London. Although Warsaw can boast of most rapidly developing flex space segment, Poland also offers some other regional markets such as Cracow, Tri – City, Poznan that do not fall much behind. As a consequence, a big demand for flex space offices drives a fast growth of their suppliers (also called the operators). In Poland flex space operators spring up like mushrooms. Many of them have been established in recent three years when the total amount of flex spaces offices has doubled. Although it is a young segment, but it has a high potential. It satisfies tenants’ growing demands and fulfills employees’ altering needs regarding workspace. All this undoubtedly has contributed to the development of flex space office segment not only in Poland  but also globally.