Consolidated Overhead and Rapid Business Growth Through Community-Driven Coworking Camaraderie

Stephanie Davis (00:03) Hi, I'm Stephanie Davis. I own a Farmers Insurance Agency here in Pleasant Valley, and I'm located inside of the Shoal Creek Community CO-OP. I've been utilizing this space for a year now. I just moved into my second suite here. We started in a smaller suite and then we grew very quickly and now we're in a bigger one. of the biggest benefits I've experienced so far is #1 - the camaraderie. And it feels like a family. Like we're all in the same space. We're all running different businesses, but we all have something in common. We're all small business owners trying to grow our businesses and our teams. So it just feels like there's a lot of resources at the tip of my fingers. And I don't really have to drive anywhere to kind of ⁓ have that community. This has added so much value to my business because I have one person I can contact if anything goes wrong and they're very prompt with taking care of issues. They're very prompt in adjusting with me and what is necessary for my helped me consolidate my overhead into one payment so I can focus more on growth and spending more money on my team rather than spending so much on overhead. Well, I'm here probably 6 days a week. So I am either running insurance appointments or I'm networking or we are coming here on a Saturday for some sort of event. My church that I attend actually did a big event here at this church. And then my B&I chapter that I'm a part of just moved into this building as well, so... There are tons of things that keep me at this building. It's not isolating. When I was at just my own office space in my own storefront, it was very isolating. I felt like I was on an island all by myself. And being here at the CO-OP, like, there's always a friendly face that you walk by, whether it's in the kitchen or just walking through the hallways. Everybody's so willing to just stop and say, "Hey, how's your day going? What's new with you?" And so it just feels like a family. It feels like a good network of people that enjoy being here and they want to grow here. And you don't get that just being isolated at a coffee shop or at your own storefront. While I've been in this CO-OP space running my business, I've met a lot of people in the community. Heather and Bob are both great at networking and connecting people. So if the person that I need to connect with isn't already in our building, they're very resourceful in connecting me with whoever I need for whatever project, whether it's like - I made t-shirts for my team at one point, and Heather gave me that to someone that's not actually in our building. And I've worked with Bob and he's always telling me like, "Hey, whatever resources you need, just reach out." I had worked in Coworking space before. The experience I had there was less than ideal. And so I was more hesitant to go into another coworking space and it be that "not so good vibe." So I was more worried about the vibe of who I was going to be in the coworking space with over it being at a church. Because when you walk in this building, it doesn't really give you "church" vibes. It gives you "community environment" vibes.