HomeWork, the exciting and flexible co-working space, has arrived at Ram Quarter, offering fantastic business solutions and a cracking cup of coffee, too.
We caught up with HomeWork’s Commercial Director, Abbie, to find out more.
Hey Abbie! Tell us about yourself.
I’m Abbie and I’m HomeWork’s Commercial Director. I joined back in April 2021 as a part-time barista in our Putney site, while also working part-time on fundraising and charity events. When we opened our second site in Southfields in July 2021 I was given the opportunity to manage the team there as head of Southfields.
At the end of 2021 I moved into a business development role, and now I oversee all of our sales and marketing strategies. I’m lucky I still get to know all of our members through our community events, and have the opportunity to focus on strategic business growth.
How did HomeWork come about?
The business was incorporated in late 2018. We signed the lease on our first site in Putney in April 2019, and opened a few months later in August.
Our co-founders, Claire and Sam, wanted to offer something different when it came to flexible working. They both come from corporate finance backgrounds and have had their own experience of flexible working throughout their careers. In that time they found that a suitable alternative to working from home was hard to find, and workspace facilities for individuals were, and still are, pretty limited, particularly in residential areas of London.
Claire is a chartered accountant and worked at PwC for 14 years, having joined as part of their graduate scheme. She took a career break in November 2017 to focus on family and that’s when the idea of HomeWork was born! Claire said:
“Starting a business has always been a dream of mine, and I’m constantly pinching myself that we’re actually here! The idea came to us over a few glasses of rosé, borne out of our individual, less-than-perfect experiences of flexible working. We feel passionately that the current offerings don’t quite hit the mark and we wanted to do something that would better support the individual and smaller businesses; enabling people to ‘work from home’ in an environment more conducive to productivity.”
Sam worked in corporate finance at a private equity firm for four years. He started his career, like Claire, as a graduate at PwC, initially training as a chartered accountant, and then working in their transaction services team. Sam isn’t involved in the day-to-day running of the business, but he does offer useful insights, and provide lots of moral support.
Before Covid, and the subsequent lockdowns impacted every business and employee, our lovely customers were local people who worked flexibly and loved what HomeWork had to offer; a local, professional environment which offered a sense of community. During Covid we had to close for a few months, which was heart-breaking, but we reopened our doors in April 2020 to serve coffee and eventually reopened the workspace, once it was safe to do so.
In October 2020 we secured funding to open a further three sites, and in July 2021 we opened the doors to our second site in Southfields. Being three times the size of our Putney site, Southfields definitely came with its own set of challenges, but we’ve learnt a lot. We now have quite a big, and growing, community in Southfields. We also feel we have lots of lovely regular café customers who come in every day for their daily dose of our delicious speciality coffee.
We opened our third site in Fulham Broadway in April 2022, and we’re continuing our expansion in South West London with our fourth site at Ram Quarter, Wandsworth. We’re so excited to be part of the Ram community and expand our network of members.
What does HomeWork Wandsworth offer?
HomeWork Wandsworth will provide a flexible workspace, and exceptional coffee, to small and growing local businesses who need flexibility in both facilities and pricing, helping them be efficient with their budgets while also delivering a professional and well serviced environment.
We offer fixed desks, hot desks, ergonomic chairs, high speed and reliable WiFi, breakout spaces, printing, private phone booths, meeting rooms, private offices, and a studio space. We also have a variety of membership options, including pay-as-you-go, and we aim to be as flexible as we possibly can to accommodate all of our customers.
We’ve worked on building our community to facilitate small, growing businesses with the introduction of our Business Club, which provides unlimited access to our networking events as well as access to professionals in business coaching, marketing, HR, and branding.
We’ve heard the coffee is pretty special, can you vouch for that?
We have a speciality coffee shop at each site, serving some of the finest coffee and tea London has to offer, including Rosslyn Coffee, Origin Coffee, PLOT, and Teasup. We guarantee you’ll enjoy a tasty brew carefully crafted by our talented baristas. Every member of the team, no matter what their job title, receives training from Origin, Rosslyn, and our amazing in-house baristas.
When I first started at HomeWork I didn’t know much about coffee at all. Now, I can’t get through the day without it, and I’ve probably become a bit of a coffee snob, ha-ha! My go-to order would be a soya flat white or a long black.
Will HomeWork Wandsworth members be able to access workshops and networking events?
Absolutely! Our HomeWork Business Club gives permanent members access to all our Networking and Masterclass events. We also welcome non-members at our events; tickets are just £10 per person and attendees are invited to stay and co-work for the day for free afterwards. All of our events can be found on our website.
What would you say to anyone considering making HomeWork their new flexible workspace?
Come in and trial the space for a day. Reach out through our website and request a free trial day. One of our lovely front of house team will book you in for a day of your choice. You’ll get the opportunity to try out a desk space and phone booths, and of course our delicious coffee! After, a member of the team can help you with deciding which membership option might suit you best.
What do you like most about Wandsworth Town?
There’s so much going on! Ram Quarter is home to so many exciting businesses that I’m looking forward to getting to know. It feels like a great community hub, and I can’t wait for HomeWork to become fully immersed in it.
