Airbnb Has Entered Coworking. Here’s What Workspace Operators Need to Know
Airbnb can help people find a workspace. But can it help them find a community?
Breaking news this week: Airbnb has announced it’s adding coworking spaces to its list of services.
The UK market is the first location Airbnb is testing this new feature, with flexible workspace brands Oneder and Work.Life participating in a pilot. Airbnb users can book day passes and meeting rooms through its platform.
On the surface, this makes perfect sense. Airbnb has always been about helping people experience a place, and coworking is another way to enhance that experience.
But the caveat is: if coworking becomes easier to access, does it become less valuable?
Let’s dive into what Airbnb adding coworking means for your workspace business.
Airbnb was built on the idea of sharing space
Today, Airbnb is a household name, and many of us use the platform to book apartments and homes from our holidays. Yet, the company has very grassroot beginnings.
In 2007, San Francisco-based roommates, Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia, were struggling to afford their extortionate rent in the city. A major design conference was coming to San Francisco, and with all local hotels booked, the founders decided to inflate air beds in their living room and rent them out.
Three strangers booked to stay in their home…and that was the seed for Airbnb.
Of course, the company grew to what we know as Airbnb today. But the founding story shows that the intent behind Airbnb was about sharing space, trust, and hospitality (the founders even cooked their guests breakfast).
The overlap between Airbnb and coworking is clear, both built around the idea that you can make better use of a space while creating experiences that bring people together.
That’s why Airbnb expanding into services makes sense. Adding coworking is another way for people to experience a city, whether they’re travelling, working remotely, or simply looking for somewhere different to spend the day.
A new way for people to discover coworking
Coworking is still a slightly undiscovered segment. People who don’t really understand coworking either associate it with WeWork, or a big, noisy social space where you can’t get any work done.
The good news is that Airbnb adding coworking to its list of services means that more people will develop this understanding, and experience coworking for themselves.
A comment from Work.Life, published in a Coworking Europe article about the news, shared:
“It’s an exciting new way for more travellers, remote workers and digital nomads to discover our spaces and experience the community and energy that make us different.”
Work.Life and Oneder’s participation in the pilot makes sense, especially if the coworking operators are planning for further expansion. Work.Life, for example, operates 11 spaces across London and Manchester, while Oneder has three sites in London: Old Street, White City, and Kings Cross.
Both coworking providers have top-of-the-range meeting rooms. These types of bookings have become a lucrative revenue stream in a hybrid working age.
As Airbnb experiences are for anyone to use, not just travellers and guests staying in Airbnb accommodation, this move positions the platform as more of a marketplace for discovering flexible workspaces, similar to existing coworking aggregators.
Discovery isn’t the same as belonging
While this move may help more people discover and understand coworking, the downside is that Airbnb users may just associate coworking with office space and meeting rooms, consuming workspaces as services, and missing out on that sense of belonging because they don’t see coworking in that way.
This is the bigger challenge for the industry, and it’s why some coworking operators aren’t in favour of providing day passes or ad-hoc bookings, particularly the smaller, more independent coworking spaces.
The difference between a larger coworking brand and a small independent space often comes down to capacity and business model.
Larger operators can often absorb more day-pass users across multiple locations. For example, someone books a Work.Life space in London one week might then book a location in Manchester the next.
Meanwhile, smaller spaces rely more heavily on a consistent membership base and local relationships. Again, Airbnb’s move could result in the deeper meaning of coworking being missed. After all, coworking has never just been about access to a workspace, but about community.
The interactions you have with others over weeks and months, the conversations over coffee, the introductions that lead to collaborations, and the familiarity of walking into a place where someone knows your name.
Sharing the announcement on its Instagram channel, Flockhere (@flockhere) put this into words:
“Finding somewhere to work is important. Finding people to work with can make all the difference.”
That’s not something you can experience in a single afternoon, but it’s when people return to a space again and again.
A day pass becomes a doorway
For coworking spaces in tourist destinations or major cities, partnering with the likes of Airbnb could be a valuable route to discovery. A traveller needing somewhere to take a meeting, or a spot with a reliable Wi-Fi connection, might never find your workspace otherwise.
When I spoke to Justin Powers, the founder of Kernville Cowork, he highlighted that destination coworking spaces often experience seasonal demand. For example, the Kern River Valley has excellent whitewater rafting rivers between mid-April and July – the region’s peak tourist season.
Justin opened Kernville Cowork for the local community, but it’s also a productive workspace for remote workers and travellers during tourist season. Justin’s intention is that the workspace will give a visitors a reason to keep coming back to Kernville. Eventually, they may even lay down roots there.
This follows a shift where people are no longer needing to live where they work but instead being able to work where they want to live. This is actually what brought Justin back to his hometown of Kernville in the first place.
Airbnb’s role will become interesting, as it could help people discover destinations where they’ll eventually spend more time in.
When coworking becomes easier to access, belonging matters more
Airbnb’s partnership with the coworking sector is ultimately a sign that flexible workspace is becoming part of the mainstream way people think about work and travel.
For operators, this presents an opportunity: more people may discover coworking spaces who would never have considered them before.
But discovery is only the first step. The challenge is making sure those people understand that coworking is not just somewhere to sit with a laptop but a place to connect, collaborate, and feel part of something.
What are your views on this move? I’d love to hear what you think.
Until next time,
Lucy