Eli Pace / epace@skyhinews.com
Two young entrepreneurs have opened a new co-working space in Winter Park that could easily appeal to powder-seeking pros on the Front Range, but might also offer a local business owner room to grow, too.
Owned by Jayson Harris and Austin Gray, Green Spaces has private office space, dedicated desks and comfortable lounge seating available for lease at its newest location in downtown Winter Park.
“It’s a place for people to come and work,” Harris said. “It could be for entrepreneurs, freelancers, founders of companies, remote workers, local businesses or startup companies.”
Green Spaces relies on a membership-based business model much like a gym. On Main Street, Green Spaces sits below residential condos in a glass-walled commercial space by The Perk coffee shop, putting the new business within easy access of downtown and its many amenities.
“The location was really important to be right in the middle of downtown Winter Park,” Harris said, adding that the nearby mountain bike trails have already proven to be a great asset.
Perks of a Green Spaces membership also include free coffee and tea from The Perk, which has the same owners, happy hours, daily human interaction, 24/7 access and Wifi. The co-working space is leased out through membership packages, and the packages are offered at a few levels.
“You can have your own private office, you can have a dedicated desk or you can have access to the lounge, which is similar to a coffee shop,” Harris said of the different membership tiers.
Green Spaces has 11 offices inside its Winter Park location for lease, in addition to a sleek common area with dedicated desks and a cozy lounge space with couches and soft seating. There are also conference rooms, fast internet and a modern interior design with a nod to sustainability. The offices start at $695 a month while a dedicated desk runs $250 a month and lounge space is $195 a month.
“The idea behind co-working is it’s a sustainable way for people to have a place to come work,” Harris said, emphasizing that some professionals might not want to sign long-term leases, buy insurance or jump through all the necessary hoops to open their own office space.
Green Spaces in Winter Park is the business’s second location after it first opened in Denver’s River North Arts District (RiNo) in 2008. With sites in Denver and Winter Park, members can easily shift their work from Denver to Winter Park, and vise versa, under a single membership that’s good at both locations.
“Another thing that’s really cool about a partnership we’ve done … is we have a network of 300-plus spaces throughout the U.S., which are primarily focused in Colorado and Colorado mountain towns, so if someone has a membership at Green Spaces, they can get unlimited access to Winter Park and Denver, plus three days access to pretty much all of the other mountain towns within Colorado,” Gray said.
Such an arrangement could easily bridge the gap for someone who works and lives on the Front Range and wants to squeeze in some ski trips, especially on a weekday.
However, the two owners have also found that professionals living in the area year-round can find value in having a base for their business operations as well. By signing on with Green Spaces, they might even land an office setting they otherwise couldn’t afford.
“We would love to enable local entrepreneurs, local startup companies, local remote workers to be here,” Harris said of Green Spaces. “That’s going to be the community; that’s the base of who we are. The tourists and drop-ins, and the people coming up from Denver, that will certainly be a part of this space … but what we get really excited about is creating a healthy environment in Winter Park for innovation and startup companies.”
For more about the business, go to GreenSpaces.com.