Once exclusive to startups, NC Triangle coworking spaces open up to remote workers

Two of the oldest coworking spaces in the North Carolina Triangle aren’t actually that old.

American Underground opened in downtown Durham in 2010, five years after the first modern coworking community is said to have formed in San Francisco. Then in 2012, what is today known as Raleigh Founded launched on Hillsborough Street under the name HUB Raleigh.

But even with their relative short histories, both spaces have undergone an evolution of sorts in the types of workers they serve.

At Raleigh Founded, prospective members initially had to apply to join, with the center selecting people only after interviews. The reason, explained Raleigh Founded executive director Lauren Romer, was to “curate more of a startup ecosystem than a coworking space.”

Today, Raleigh Founded is no longer exclusively for startups. Like many area coworking spaces, the company, which has four locations in the Triangle, has pivoted to welcome members who aren’t looking to grow their own businesses but instead seek a communal, comfortable place to work that’s not their living rooms.

The remote worker.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the number of people mainly working from home tripled from 2019 to 2021. Multiple studies show the U.S. real estate dedicated to coworking has continued to increase during this time. The job recruitment website Zippia found there were around 4,000 domestic coworking spaces in 2017 and 6,200 by last year.

“The real advantage of coworking is that it’s not my home,” said Sean Flynn, a fully remote software architect who uses the C3 coworking space in Hillsborough. “I like my home office just fine, but a lot of times if I’m at home, I’m looking at the dishes and looking at the vacuuming and looking at chores that I can be doing around the house.”

Balancing the startup spirit

The pandemic may have hindered local coworking businesses at first, but the resulting influx of remote employees has driven demand, operators say.

“We just updated our homepage,” said Tim Scales, executive director of American Underground. “It used to say ‘Welcome to the startup hub of the South.’ Now we’re ‘Durham’s coworking community for innovators, creators and changemakers.’”

There are today dozens of coworking options across the region, from Pittsboro to Knightdale, with several having opened in only the past few years. Many feature common amenities: brightly lit open-concept work rooms, secluded offices, interview booths, beer on tap and coffee at the ready.

But there’s also a wealth of variety across the Triangle spaces too. There are communities that cater to Black-led startups, one that offers unique warehousing for companies with tangible goods, and another, called Blush, that’s the first female-focused coworking space in the state with on-site childcare.

“I think there should be more of these in the world,” said Danielle Leach, a Blush member who brings her 9-month-old daughter to the coworking community in Cary. Leach works remotely as an accounting manager. Her husband, Cody Leach, is also a remote accountant who weaves coworking into his work-from-home routine.

But for communities like Raleigh Founded and American Underground — which formed to serve entrepreneurs — there is a balancing act to preserving their startup-centric spirit while accommodating more remote employees.

“We’ve been able to keep the culture, but we have added more people in different industry areas,” Romer said.

The efforts seem to be paying off. Later this year, Founded is scheduled to open its fifth Triangle location in Cary.

This story was produced with financial support from a coalition of partners led by Innovate Raleigh as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The N&O maintains full editorial control of the work.

Open Source

Do you enjoy Triangle tech news? Subscribe to Open Source, The News & Observer's weekly technology newsletter and look for it in your inbox every Friday morning. Sign up here.