One Regus client in New York, David Robertson, said he had been looking forward to working at home from his Lower Manhattan apartment when he took a job in 2006 with a startup company that licenses images from college sports events, but that he lasted less than three months.
"There seemed to be a lot of distractions," he said, "whether it was my children, or the refrigerator, or some home improvement project that was just sitting there staring at me."
His company pays slightly less than US$1,000 a month for the cubicle he selected over an office with a closing door because it presented more opportunities to socialize. He now wears a suit and tie to work when he wants to, and enjoys the reassuring cadences of the 9-to-5 world, as well as the camaraderie of his new office mates.
"It's not like they're best friends," he said of his fellow business lounge denizens and the Regus staff members who are there to support them. "But they're adults you can have a conversation with."
Young Wiese, who pays US$650 a month for a desk in a communal office in a private house near her apartment, said she, too, is happy to be surrounded by office mates who are friendly, if less gregarious than Wiese. They share job leads with one another, they go out to lunch.
She added that she prefers these relationships to those in a traditional office.
"You have this collegial atmosphere, but it's not fraught with any work issues or roles or responsibilities," she said.
Several of them are women who, like her, have abandoned their home offices to their work-at-home husbands.
Abby Vaughn, an advertising representative for Canadian newspapers, actually took over her husband's space at the communal office when he was dismissed by the office manager after two weeks because his telephone manner was too loud. He is once again selling market research from home, while Vaughn goes off to the rented cubicle.
"He's worked from his apartment for two years," his wife explained. "He wasn't used to being around people."
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