COVID-19 Update

Dear members, dear community,

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic we are faced with unprecedented circumstances and all of us are now tasked with making decisions that help keep as many lives safe as possible. 

To that end I will soon have to close Davis Coworking. For the time being we added additional cleaning procedures, are providing disinfecting wipes, hand sanitizer and our air filters are MERV-13 rated, which filter out most viruses and bacteria. However, please use common sense; this virus is contagious before symptoms occur, so keep your distance to others, and wipe your work area/chair before and after you use it.

For members with automatically renewing memberships, you can cancel your membership by signing in on davis-coworking.com and going to “My Account”. Members who just renewed can request prorated refunds or use the missed time after we open back up. Although we are a new business it is my hope that we can make it through these uncertain times and be there for you when the virus is under control.

Although the times ahead may be tough, remember that social distancing is an act of generosity and compassion toward others, by eliminating our interactions we reduce the likelihood for viral transmission. 

So lets take this moment to acknowledge the stress and uncertainty that we are feeling, accept this feeling without judgement in ourselves and others and observe our capability for basic goodness. We can then look around and appreciate the contributions of those around us for all they are doing to help in this crisis. 

Please do not hesitate to reach out if you have any questions, need help, advice or just want to connect.

All my best,

~ Do Tromp
Owner Davis Coworking

Join for the official opening of the new ground level space!

We are excited to announce that Davis Coworking is expanding! We are adding a ground level addition that features a main room with 18 shared workspaces and a conference room that seats 8. The new space is located right around the corner from the original space, and will be available to all members of the current upstairs coworking space. The new addition will also be available to be booked for events, such as teaching events, workshops and retreats.

On Wednesday January 22 we will officially open the new space with a ribbon cutting event hosted together with the Davis Chamber of Commerce. Please join us to celebrate the expansion and to check out the new space, as well as the existing upstairs space if you haven’t seen it yet. Everyone is welcome to attend.

When: 5-6PM Ribbon Cutting, 6PM and onwards celebration.
Where: Davis Coworking at 825 Russell Boulevard, Suite 35-36, Davis CA 95616. Find us right next to the east entrance of University Mall.

It promises to be a great event with beer and sparkling water on tap, delicious snacks and lots of good company. A number of coworkers are bringing something special to share! A great opportunity to catch up with the Davis Coworking community!

I feel especially thankful for how Davis Coworking is continuing to grow and has given me the opportunity to meet so many awesome people. I hope to see you at the opening!

~ Do Tromp
Owner Davis Coworking

Why I built a Green Business

What does it mean to build a business? Everyone has different motivations, and for Do Tromp, the owner of Davis Coworking, social and environmental sustainability has been an important driver (read their mission statement here). To that end all the energy used at Davis Coworking is 100% sourced from renewable resources through Valley Clean Energy.

“Cleaner energy is smarter.” — Do Tromp, Founder Davis Coworking, Davis resident, UltraGreen customer.

David Coworking is currently 1 of only 3 businesses in Davis, CA to go UltraGreen, and Valley Clean Energy is hoping that more businesses will follow suit when they see how easy and affordable it is to opt up. To get the conversation started they talked with the owner of Davis Coworking, Do Tromp, to hear why her small business made the choice to go 100% green. Their interview is shared below.

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Davis Coworking is a shared office environment founded by Do Tromp, a Dutch-born environmental enthusiast who moved to the US 10 years ago. Davis Coworking aims to promote sustainable business practices for start-ups and small companies by providing a flexible work environment that can help businesses accomplish their goals while maintaining a commitment to the planet.

“We opted up!” sticker by Valley Clean Energy — Davis Coworking uses 100% renewable carbon free energy.

Opened May 1, 2019 at 757 Russell Blvd., Davis Coworking offers its members access to bright, cheerful working spaces, shared amenities and conference rooms. It’s a perfect solution for self-employed or startup businesses and professionals who lack dedicated professional space of their own. There are currently about 20 members who pay monthly membership fees, and 20 more who purchase sets of day passes or single-use passes to use the office space and its amenities, which include fiber optic Wifi, printing, free parking, and pleasant, green surroundings.

Do grew up in the Netherlands, where activism around environmental issues seemed much more prevalent than it is here. “I experienced a bit of a shock when I moved to the US a decade ago and saw that the infrastructure is not set up to be conscientious and cautious about energy usage. Whether it’s at home or at my business, I try to maximize my opportunities for saving energy,” she said.

The “Cup-board” aims to reduce waste from paper cups by incentivizing members to reuse their own mugs.

In addition to opting up to 100% renewable, carbon-free UltraGreen electricity, Davis Coworking uses smart LED lighting and smart thermostats to support sustainability. They recycle paper and plastic, discourage the use of individual plastic water bottles by offering filtered water in the office, and aim to reduce the use of paper cups by brewing fresh coffee daily that’s served from ceramic mugs kept on-hand in their “cup-board.”

“This is not just a business I’m running,” Do told us. “My aim is to demonstrate that profitability and sustainability can go hand-in-hand. I hope to support and inspire other small business owners to run a successful business while also keeping in mind an environmentally conscious outlook.”

Watch the Presidential Candidate Debate with us at Davis Coworking this Wednesday!

Have you been curious about the stances of each of the democratic candidates? Or are you looking forward to gripe in public about the presidential election? Join us this Wednesday for a Democratic Presidential Candidate Debate watch party!

Everyone is welcome to join us at Davis Coworking to watch the 2020 Democratic Primary debate! Bring friends and snacks as we gather to watch the fifth democratic primary debate. Vote in our straw poll for your preferred candidate! 

When: Wednesday, November 20, 2019, 5:30PM - 8PM, debate broadcast begins at 6pm!
Where: Our brand new downstairs expansion of Davis Coworking at 825 Russell Boulevard, Davis CA 95616. Find us right next to the east entrance of University Mall. More information on this expansion will follow soon, we are currently building tables and hope to open soon! 

Feel free to share this email with anyone who you think would like to join in. And as always, if you have questions, do not hesitate to reach out.

Join us this Wednesday for 1 Million Cups

Davis Coworking is excited to host 1 Million Cups this Wednesday and we hope you will join us! Two local startup companies will present their businesses in 6 minute presentations that are followed by 15 minutes of feedback and Q&A from the audience. This free event is presented in collaboration with 1 Million Cups Sacramento.

Moreover there will be free coffee and donuts! 

Schedule:

8:50-9:00: Coffee & Networking (optional)
9:00-10:00: Startup Pitches with Audience Feedback
10:00-10:30: Coffee & Networking (optional)

Presenters:

Pheronym makes pheromones that control parasitic roundworms called nematodes. Their product improves plant health and yield using pheromones that make good nematodes kill more insect pests in the soil and prevent bad nematodes from attacking our crops. More information at pheronym.com

GALY is the Beyond Meat for textiles. They have developed a proprietary way to grow Cotton in the lab that is 10x faster, requires 78% less water, 81% less land and 80% fewer gas emissions, with superior quality and cheaper than Egyptian cotton. More information at galy.co.

What is 1 Million Cups

1 Million Cups is a free, national program designed to educate, engage, and connect entrepreneurs. Developed by the Kauffman Foundation, 1MC is based on the notion that entrepreneurs discover solutions and network over a million cups of coffee.

How procrastination got me to build a business

Today marks the day that my new venture Davis Coworking has officially been open for 1 week and I would like to take a moment to explain why I started Davis Coworking and reflect on all the progress that was made since its inception two months ago.

Roughly two years into my Phd I realized that there was this big idea bubbling inside my brain that wanted to come out, I told my brain that focussing on this idea was not a good plan since attending to brain ideas is much more fun than finishing existing projects (my Phd) so I put a lid on it.

Repeatedly.

After moving from WI to CA and writing infinite TO DO lists (those lists are aptly named after me) I finished my Phd three years later.

Yay! A sigh of relief, I can finally take the lid off my idea planning brain area!

Womp womp. Queue sad trombone:

The Idea was still there, but now that I had somewhat infinite time (disclaimer: I continue to have a part time position at the university) the path seemed a little more real. Everything that was holding me back was now, all of a sudden, an actual option and it felt a lot more daunting.

*I’m gonna kick Idea into reality!*

Many months passed, and beside a pretty cool, although very minimalist, TO DO list, I was not actually making any progress towards making my Idea real. Instead I was busy baking bread, building furniture, tending to the garden. You know, literally the garden variety procrastinations.

At first I blamed it on post Phd exhaustion, but after 6 months I had to face reality. Maybe it was time for me to find a Job. Jobs can be fun right? Almost everyone I know has had at least one of those, so there must be something to it, right? To be fair, I had been able to avoid having a real job for the first 35 years of my life, so this was going to get tricky.

As it turns out, it is really hard to find a job when in reality you want to make a job. So on February 24, after a long conversation with my man, and right before falling asleep I wrote a note to myself:

The next morning I checked out two local coworking spaces and after seeing both, it suddenly dawned on me: I should start my own coworking space!

It would make total sense; I love the startup scene (case in point, in college I majored in Science & Innovation management, I go to TechCrunch Disrupt and Machine Learning conference for fun), I love bringing people together, I love supporting mission driven companies, I can build some of the furniture myself (see earlier procrastinations), and maybe I can build an environment that will help me tackle the barriers that kept me from making progress on Idea.

Couple days before signing the lease (March 21st)

One month later, on March 25, I sign the lease to a 2300 sqft office space. I must be crazy. How am I going to explain to friends and family that my Neuroscience Phd was really an excellent preparation for me to run a successful coworking space? It’s not, and I have no idea what I am doing…

So I learn.

So many pocket holes, in so many tables

I learn about negotiating a lease, repairing ceiling tiles, setting up an LLC, getting a local business permit, setting up a business bank account, going on the roof to fix the HVAC system, creating a website that can accept payments, effective marketing, keeping track of accounting, doing market research, moving furniture, staying on budget, driving pickup trucks around town to pick up furniture and wood, lots of wood, building six 8–12ft tables, managing a soft opening, determine pricing, follow leads, ensure fire safety, hosting an opening event, getting in the newspaper, creating signage. But most importantly on how to get it all ready in time for the opening that you planned when nothing was clear yet.

Davis Coworking is open!

And that’s where I am now. Davis Coworking has been officially open for one full week. Since its inception I have learned so so much, and I have worked so hard, with so much enjoyment. In reality I am still waiting for the other shoe to drop.

It seems like being in school for the better part of 35 years really did help me open a coworking space. I was able to realize what I knew and what I still needed to learn.

All in all, months of untethered procrastination caused me to build Davis Coworking. Which in itself is procrastination from Idea, but at least I was able to build myself a (currently unpaid) job. Now all I have to do is learn how to make Davis Coworking a success, by building an environment of entrepreneurship, collaborations and learning so that I can allow Idea to naturally flourish into reality.

I can not wait.

First public event at Davis Coworking

Would you like to do work at Davis Coworking? Find more information at: www.davis-coworking.com.

Davis Coworking Soft Opening

Only one more week until Davis Coworking officially opens its doors on May 1st! In the mean time we would like to slowly start testing our facilities and you are invited to come try Davis Coworking for free during our soft opening this week. All we ask is your constructive feedback and suggestions that would make your experience better.

We will be open during office hours (9am-5pm, Mo-Fri), so feel free to come get some work done, or to just to say hi. The space is located at 757 Russell Blvd, Davis CA 95616, right above the Subway.

You are also invited to attend our opening event on April 30, when we will present the new space and celebrate the official opening of Davis Coworking. Join us for a beverage and a bite between 5:30-8:30PM.

I hope to see you soon at Davis Coworking!