Nicer-looking working spaces may be one of the keys to coaxing employees back to the office.
Key Details
- Some businesses are sprucing up their office spaces as new data shows that employees are more likely to return to nicer offices.
- Data from the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) showed that fancier Class A+ buildings in Manhattan had greater attendance than Class B buildings.
- Preferring nicer office spaces is not a new trend, but the effects have been exaggerated since the pandemic, Axios reports.
- Prime locations and appealing in-office amenities can encourage workers back to the office.
Why it’s news
Whether or not employees return to the office is not just a concern for employers but for city business owners, too. A 10% increase in the current office occupancy rates could bring in another 100,000 to 200,000 employees to New York’s office districts. Each employee spends around $6,000 per year in the city on everything from clothing to food, Axios reports.
For employers looking for ways to tempt their employees to return, offering nicer office spaces could be one key incentive. For example, businesses in SL Green’s One Madison building will have access to a catering service provided within the building and run by celebrity chef Daniel Boulud.
The report uses location analytics to determine how many individuals visited various office buildings in the office districts of Manhattan. Using this method, REBNY found that more people visited Class A+ buildings.
REBNY’s method found that building visitation passed 60% of pre-pandemic levels. Kastle Systems, another popular method for measuring office occupancy, showed that buildings were at 50% of pre-pandemic levels. However, some have criticized Kastle’s data as some of the largest developers in New York do not use Kastle.