Last year, The We Company filed its highly anticipated initial public offering for its coworking company WeWork. At the time, there was much investor concern over the firm’s corporate governance structure, which led the company to restructure its operations and receive a bailout from SoftBank.
When the pandemic hit, the company was further shaken to its core. With millions of people shifting to working from home, large vacancies plagued the firm.
However, CEO Sandeep Mathrani says that companies have started looking into taking out workspace that accommodates new physical distancing requirements.
“In an ironic way, Covid actually brought to the forefront the value of flexibility. We were very quickly able to de-densify our common areas, our lounges, our office space,” said Mathrani. “We were very quickly able to do deals with companies.”
Now, the company is offering two weeks of free All Access as an incentive to bring members back into the office or renew their leases. According to Mathrani, financial institutions have approached the company to use All Access and pay for 200 passes, allowing workers to work from any WeWork location in New York.
Additionally, the company has launched another product called On Demand, which allows professionals to rent an office hourly, daily or weekly without a membership.
The company will also be transforming some of its spaces in its “We for Education” program that helps de-densify schools and offers a new place for students to work.