The open house on Thursday August 9th was a great success! There was a steady flow of people throughout the day. Among them were writers, software developers, advertisers, a documentary movie-maker, a virtual assistant, and our favorite alderman. It was so great to see people connecting and, yes, even collaborating right there on the very first day at Cowork Frederick.

After getting a tour of the space, our very first guest said, “So … I thought I’d do a little work and see how it goes.” Feeling a little silly for not offering it as an option during the tour, I said “Of course! That’s why we’re here, right?”  Others joined and, with that, we had our first bit of coworking happening right then and there at our open house. Wow.

As promised, there was cake — homemade, in case you can’t tell (LOL!!), baked right there in the Cowork Frederick oven! In case you missed it and the cake is a bit confusing, August 9 was the 7th “birthday” of working, which is why we chose that day for our open house.

We especially appreciate all the great questions, confirmation of some of plans for the second floor, and great new ideas we received. We’re already updating our plans accordingly (see, the community really does shape a coworking space!)  We learned that conference / meeting room space is of particular interest. Quiet/private phone rooms are also important. We also received some good feedback on our membership levels. Suggestions included a members-only board where business cards and announcements could be posted, adding profiles of all our members on our website, and offering a referral bonus/prize. Based on the input we received, we’ve reprioritized the tasks remaining to complete our remodel and are updating our rate plans and website.

Special thanks go to:

• John, who took the plunge to be the first to work at Cowork Frederick and also the first to sign up as a member
• Jessica (http://jesshibb.com/), who took photos and made her own blog post (http://storiesandideas.com/blog/), joined, and then promoted and answered questions about Cowork Frederick via Twitter (and continues to do so).
• Julie, who came back after her first visit that day, having tweeted that she’d be at the Cowork Frederick open house and inviting others to join her. Sure enough, some did!