Office suites, also known as executive suites, provide a very unique office space experience. Sometimes they are classified as shared office space or a sublease office, but really aren’t either of those. Office suites are set up and managed by a company whose sole business is to lease and mange that space. They are a great solution if your business needs a flexible lease term since office suites provide hourly, month to month, or longer term offices. It’s also great if you want a smaller office in a prestigious location, with office suite locations in swanky zip codes around the world. Suites include many built in amenities out of the box, such as conference rooms, phone, internet, answering services and printing, but these are usually accompanied by additional fees for their use. Office suites are very flexible, but that flexibility usually doesn’t come cheap. You will usually pay a slight premium for your office suite space over a more informal shared space. Usually that premium is worth the flexibility and the professional image provided to for your business. If you are a consultant or salesperson, or travel extensively and need a place to work on the road, office suites are a great solution since they offer memberships that provide access to work spaces in many different cities. However, this is usually limited to the bigger providers, such as Regus.

Although business suites are great for smaller companies, keep in mind that they do not scale very well when your business starts growing. Once you begin to occupy more executive suite space, you will tend to get better economies of scale from a traditionally leased space. Plus, if you want flexibility with the interior of your office space then office and executive suites might not be right for you since most of the interior is pre-packaged decor and furniture.

Who is office or executive suite space for:

• Small to medium sized business looking for a straighforward short term solution
• Consultants or sales people who need a work space option while travelling
• Business looking to for a virtual office, or an office only a few times per week
• Businesses who want to portray a professional image, but don’t want the restrictions of a long term lease

Pros of Office/Executive Suite Space:

• Get into the space quickly
• No up front capital expenditure (All services packaged together)
• Flexible lease terms
• Professionally managed space
• Fully equipped to handle all office needs out of the gate
• Usually 24/7 access

Cons of Office/Executive Suite Space:

• Usually must pay for use of amenities
• Space usually “As Is”, limited customization
• Amenities are shared, you don’t choose who you share with
• Limited expansion options
• Location are limited