Despite the return of employees to office workplaces in the post-pandemic world, co-working spaces are continuing to see growth industry-wise, as more people prefer flexibility.
The global coworking space market is expected to grow from $7.97 billion in 2020 to $8.14 billion in 2021, at a compound annual growth rate of 2.1%. It is expected to reach $13.3 billion by 2025, according to a study called "Co-working Space Global Market Report 2021: COVID-19 Growth and Change to 2030," as reported by Business Wire.
Enclave reported that the rise in popularity of co-working was a direct result of the COVID-19 pandemic, during which many companies were forced to shut down offices. Employees not only began working remotely but learned a new term: "hybrid work."
"In the city of Chicago, there are millions of coworking places," Robert Kellman, owner of the Enclave co-working space, said. "You can't walk 10 feet without tripping over one, but they simply didn’t exist out here, and to the extent they do, they look more like insurance offices, not someplace that we actually wanted to spend a lot of time and work."
James Berry, University College London’s MBA program director, said that hybrid working would become the main model of work in a Wired report.
Future Forum, a research group backed by Slack, found in an October 2021 survey that 17% of employees wanted to return to working in the office daily, and 34% preferred to return to the office three to five days a week. The survey also found that 57% of employees were open to looking for a new job in the upcoming year because of the choice to work at home or in the office, and the number increased to 71% among employees unhappy with the flexibility of their jobs.
There are approximately 32,000 flexible workspace locations worldwide currently, and the global market value of these workspaces is $26 billion, AllWork reported.