Through Gravitate Coworking’s participation in the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program, our founder Geoff Wood was invited to speak on 1/22/2021 with Rep. Cindy Axne, who represents Iowa’s 3rd congressional district (including the Des Moines-metro) in the US House of Representatives. We thank Congresswoman Axne for her time and work on behalf of Iowan’s in Washington, DC. The following are the remarks that Geoff shared on the call:
Congresswoman Axne: thank you for your time today and for making this opportunity available. I own a small business called Gravitate Coworking with three locations in Central and Northwest Iowa. I live in Windsor Heights. Our company creates business communities; we bring together entrepreneurs, freelancers, startup team members, non-profit professionals, remote workers and others into shared workspaces. I started the company in 2013 and I always considered what we do as the future of work, and I think the pandemic has only brought that future closer to us.
Our particular model of coworking focuses on a dense office environment, flexible membership terms and regularly serving visiting groups with meeting room and event space rentals. This model is not great for pandemic times. Further complicating the situation, we don’t have an online sales, delivery or curbside service version of what we do that we could pivot to for the duration of the public health crisis. Our revenues are down significantly, we leaned on PPP funding in the Spring, depleted a lot of the cash we’d saved for future expansion throughout the Fall and I’ve cut my own income from the business, but we entered 2021 with our full team still employed and our workspaces all open. Looking to the future post-pandemic, we see a bright future for our business and our industry. The pandemic forced the world to understand that many companies can operate successfully in a remote environment, we expect work-from-wherever to be a growing norm in the business community and that we expect to be a key player in that—BUT WE HAVE TO GET THERE and I’m worried about vaccine timelines like the one announced recently by Polk County Health that said the general public in our community is looking at “mid to late 2021 for vaccine availability”.
Like everyone on this call, I support most of the policies being advocated by the 10,000 Small Business Voices program but in particular I’d like to ask Congress to prioritize access to capital, tax incentives and credits related to COVID costs, and the expansion of options for companies and individuals to get affordable and comprehensive healthcare.
Further, I’d like to ask that Congress work now on what the next small business stimulus program may look like. I’m thankful for your support of the current aid package that includes a second round of PPP funding. Dr. Fauci said yesterday that with the Biden Administration’s ambitious vaccination rollout we can have a “degree of normality” in the country by Fall. That means eight or nine more months of rent checks and payrolls before we start to see things turn for the better. We’re going to need additional support to keep our businesses open and alive during that time. I have concerns about the revenue reduction requirements in the current PPP program as we all know that revenue doesn’t determine the health of any business, so I’d ask you to consider other factors in future packages. While we’re well under the threshold now, I’m concerned for the businesses that don’t make the 25% reduction but are still down significantly and facing increased expenses to prepare their facilities to be open during the public health crisis. As all small business owners understand, revenue along is not an indicator of health for any company.
Thank you again for this opportunity to share our story.
Geoff Wood
Owner, Gravitate Coworking