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Comment by mumblemumble | Hacker News Reader

Regus has been selling that for ages and ages. They have more locations in more cities in more countries, too. If they're not as well-known, I'm guessing it's because they're just a boring old real estate company and not a SoftBank-fueled moon rocket.

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Does Regus sell that? I just did a search for a coworking space on Regus website and it matches my earlier experience: they want me to get a quote and talk 1:1 with an advisor. Wework I can just pay for a 1 day pass at a location purely online. So its so much easier to use when traveling or if you need adhoc coworking.

I guess it's a little hard to find from their home page because the top search widget thingy is for longer-term reservations, but if you scroll down and choose the "coworking" tab, there's a tile for coworking day passes with a link you can click for the reservation page.

Yes, there are hot desk memberships on their coworking page [1], including single day purchases. They're underneath the giant "get a quote" call to action, however, which is indicative of their priorities.

[1] https://www.regus.com/en-us/coworking

Well, they’re also not bankrupt so maybe those are the right priorities.

Edit: haha j/k they also went bankrupt.

I went to one of these this summer and had to create a full corporate account online before the people at the front desk could sell me a day pass, and I was bombarded with emails for months afterwards about signing up the rest of my "company"

I went to a wework for the first time today and they technically set up a whole corporate account for just me to be there for one day to try it out.

Today? Was this disaster tourism?

They are in chapter 11, which is aimed at reorganizing a company. They hope to still be a business going forward.

For customers, it should still be relatively the same service. I expect some amenities to change, but you should still be able to rent a desk (for at least the near term).

As mbreeze stated, this location is probably going to continue operating as some form of coworking space even if it gets spun off of wework, which it may or it may not. There were a lot of people there, I imagine that location is probably cash flow positive. It would make sense for someone to operate it, as there was clearly demand at least at that location.

That is the good part about We-Work. Regus is very old school. The one I went into earlier in the year seemed to have been fitted out with plastic wood grain panels from the 70s. That's said, Regus is still running and WeWork is in Chapter 11. Plastic wood grain is fine for the price and the lack of bullshit add-ons like an extra stool.

I can only speak for Regus locations in Europe, but all of the ones I’ve visited have been new and modern, if a little office-drone boring. But frankly after being at a WeWork beforehand, I prefer the Regus blandness to the fake enthusiasm and brightly colored furniture.

Competition from WeWork seems to have gotten Regus to up their game. Like you said, it's still bland and corporate, but the quality of the spaces is pretty good.

They also seem to have a relationship with a nicer service called Spaces, but I’m not sure what the connection is exactly. Spaces seemed like a direct WeWork competitor to me.

The parent company of Regus owns Spaces.

I work with a company that has a spaces subscription and their location in Prague has so many weird rules and ways to squeese money out of both the workers and the company that I find the office to be downright unpleasant.

You're not allowed to eat food or bring your own drinks into the common areas because they want you to pay for their overpriced coffee and sandwitches. The coworking space closes at 5 and you have to leave. It opens at 8:30 and you can't enter before then. They will randomly close half the common area because someone rented it for a party. In the private office there are no power outlets at the desk. There is exactly one hookup place in the middle of the floor and we have extention cables everywhere. Despite paying (way above market) for a private office only a limited number of preaproved people are allowed to use it, anyone extra has to have a spaces subscription too. Despite allegedly renting the private office we are not allowed to use our own furnature, or electronics, or place anything on the walls (we can, but this would be paid extra).

Overall, it looks nice and has a nice view but once you see the rulebook it becomes an extremely unwelcoming experience.

Yeah my only experience with Spaces is that I stumbled into one while traveling, assuming it was a Regus location. They let me use it anyway, although I think it’s technically a separate membership.

I do have a dedicated desk in a standard Regus location and for the most part, it’s fine. Unlimited access 24:7, clean kitchen, etc. Unlike WeWork, the coffee machine isn’t free and there isn’t an on-site barista, but I don’t care about that anyway. No weird rules about food or anything else.

My protip for anyone who has arbitrary food or drink restrictions is to come with dietary restrictions - as soon as you ask for a low sodium vegan gluten free sandwich the company will give you a hall pass to bring your own food in.

I've shared this tip with so many people after actually going vegan and noticing that airplane food is less intolerable.

I asked around and apparently the same is true for all "special" meals, I thought it was interesting. Finding some related data to analyze has been on the back of my mind for a bit now.

And yes, often people are just okay with you bringing your own. I guess it works everywhere except prison, based on SBF.

Spaces is/was a Dutch WeWork clone, but they are now owned by the same parent as Regus and they've been integrating the two. My office is in a Spaces in Amsterdam and I like it, but I think the Spaces facilities outside The Netherlands are a bit of hit or miss. I think they've been quickly assembled to show a growth curve but are not all up to the same standard.

How are they in general to deal with? I was in touch with them last week and there were red flags abound. They don't respond to emails, but would rather spam my phone. The price kept increasing from the first point of contact, and they finally wanted me to pay a bill where fees again were unspecified. When I asked for a detailed, itemized bill, they ghosted me.

Their mother company iwg PLC has less than stellar reviews on trustpilot.

https://www.trustpilot.com/review/iwgplc.com

Am I missing out by looking elsewhere? They were by far the cheapest and most flexible, but I don't have time to deal with administrative bullshit and protecting myself against predatory sales.

I haven’t had any issues, but I just did everything in person. It isn’t as streamlined as WeWork, though.

I have heard negative experiences from people renting an entire office, but I only rent a desk.

Editing to add a few more details: their app and tech stuff is a little clunky and not as good as WeWork's. You have to pay via an invoice system (at least in my EU country) which is again a little clunky. Otherwise I haven't had any issues with billing, etc. – but I reiterate that I only talked to the guy on the phone to set up a meeting, and then did everything else in person.

They squeeze you on some various fees - you can rent an office, never use it, and be charged a 300 or 400 cleaning fee etc. you get charged a separate fee for access to coffee etc. pricing isnt online you work w a salesperson. Square footage is hard to find. I’m sure if you were very careful you could pick up on all this but not greatest

> That's said, Regus is still running and WeWork is in Chapter 11.

Not really:

https://globalinsolvency.com/headlines/iwg-plans-set-regus-i...

2020, during the pandemic. They seem to have recovered.

WeWork is still running too… chapter 11 is a bankruptcy where you restructure debt and keep the lights on, not where you shut down.

This is just plain wrong.

Guess which other companies filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy? Sears, BedBath&Beyond, and Circuit City. I don’t see them coming back at all.

Not saying that there is no possible comeback from chapter 11, there is. But seeing a chapter 11 filing and assuming the company will get out of it just fine is a bit preposterous.

Most of the time, the whole point of “reorganization” under chapter 11 is to keep generating whatever cash flow they can in the process, to make sure the creditors recoup as much of their investment before the (most likely inevitable) shutdown and the operations are wound down as gently as possible.

> "Guess which other companies filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy? Sears, BedBath&Beyond, and Circuit City. I don’t see them coming back at all"

General Motors, American Airlines, Marvel Entertainment, Hertz ...

And yet, chances don’t seem that good. The highest possible estimate for survival rate from chapter 11 bankruptcy that i managed to find was quoting about 25%[0].

0. https://www.forbes.com/2008/09/25/chapter-11-bankruptcy-ent-...

It’s not “plain wrong”. Sure, most chapter 11 companies don’t make it - but by filing chapter 11 instead of chapter 7, it means they’re still operating and trying to make it. Chapter 7 is “turn out the lights and liquidate”.

Yes, you are correct. Maybe I should have said there is more certainty about the future of Regus. I am not even sure of that.

I do agree, a lot of the media is saying this is a tactical move to re-negotiate a lot of expensive leases and they plan to get out of chapter 11 when they do.

If you you're a startup and need several rooms, you usually got a quote from WeWork too. But yes experience for solos might be different.

Regus has a hip brand called "spaces" that is more wework-eqsue, but you can still use all the regus locations too.

The Regus app allows you to book a 1 day without talking to anyone.

You can do that with Regus. I wouldn't recommend personally since receiving random invoices for places I have never visited.

That doesn't match my experience in Ireland. I select co-working spaces or meeting rooms, add options and checkout. I've never spoken to a Regus advisor.

Regus in Chicago used to offer a phone number for tenants then lock that number to your lease and never let you port it away. That soured me to them. I’ll never use them again. I’m glad nimble startup companies like CoHatch have figured out how to open locations in Malls in the Midwest.

There are other local coworking spaces that operate like WeWork (day/week passes obtainable online) but are not affiliated with Regus.

I googled 'regus buy day pass' and the first result was:

https://www.regus.com/en-us/membership

Boring old real estate company with nearly the identical WeWork business model that also filed a strategic bankruptcy to shed its leases a couple years earlier.

Regus has way too much bureaucracy and are also expensive (though WeWork is also expensive but it never made sense to me).

The reality might be that there are enough co-working spaces and you can paratroop into anyone and check before hand that it meets your expectation. There is nothing to franchise.

The use of the word paratroup to describe mundane business travel is fricken hilarious.

What’s next? We gonna SWAT into Hartford for an insurance sales conference?

I think they really wanted "parachute", which has been used in a non-threatening metaphorical way for a long time. You can be "parachuted into a meeting" or "parachuted into a project" for example.

Even that word sounds like something a manager who's compensating for not actually doing anything besides attending meetings would say.

at the end of the meeting they leave via the window

The correct wording makes everything look more exciting.

> Regus has way too much bureaucracy

To say the least. I recently signed up for an office at a Regus location with the explicit purpose to incorporate a company there. All went well until a few weeks later when I went there to pick up post for the company and was told I was not allowed to do so until I had submitted a particular document. Only problem is that this document can only be sent to the registered company address by post. The woman in the reception literally had the document they needed in an envelope behind her desk but could not give it to me until I had submitted that same document. Zero understanding or willingness to escalate the issue to make an exception, just hiding behind "process".

In the end I managed to get in touch with someone else in the organization who realized how ridiculous the situation was and convinced them to make an exception so I could hand in the document but I'm not impressed at all by the company, to say the least.

This is the most hilarious part to me. This is a VC’s forum, right? So, ostensibly they offer connections to the right organizational entities. But then a startup darling forms that offers a boring thing that already exists and it gets labeled as innovative. So, what were the WeWork VCs thinking? Did they expect failure or were they just wrong?

Regus doesn’t let you just book space on demand from what I could tell (admittedly years ago).

Tried to book an office for my sister’s exam in a city with Regus but no WeWork and had to get a hotel room instead as we couldn’t figure out how to actually book any space. There was just a fill out a form and we will call you option.

Regus has actually taken over a few WeWork leases in my town. Seems like they're picking up inventory for pennies on the dollar.

There's also cowork AG in Germany.

This is the reason

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