Maidenhead flexible work-space company plans to expand

A well-known flexible workspace company in central Maidenhead is set to open a third site in the town.

MyWorkSpot will be opening its third location at Proxima, 1 Grenfell Road, opposite Maidenhead train station.

The company was started in 2017 by co-founders and directors Will Ballantyne and David Johnston after they spotted a growing need for flexible office space in the area.

It currently has two other sites in Maidenhead. Clyde House in Reform Road opened in 2019 and York House in York Road launched in 2022.

Over its life, the company has seen ‘rapid expansion.’ The demand for flexible office space ‘increased significantly after COVID,’ says David. Its York Road site reached 100 per cent occupancy this year.

The Proxima addition and offers 19,000 more square feet with opportunity to expand further, making about 40,000sqft across all three of its sites so far.

Proxima will offer the same level of customer service, David says, alongside ‘a grade A fit-out’ for the offices, meeting rooms, collaborative areas for coworking as well as high speed secure Wi-Fi and parking.

Ground floor offices can accommodate companies with two to 12 people, while the first floor will work for companies of 15 up to as many as 35 people - ‘typically larger companies’ that want all-inclusive suites with internal meeting rooms.

Proxima can cater for SMEs, (small to medium-sized enterprises), scale-ups and larger corporates who want more flexible 12-24 month terms, rather than the typical five-year lease a company might get at its own dedicated offices.

David said: “When we first opened MyWorkSpot we had a clear vision that our typical customers would be local to Maidenhead who need a primary base, or start-ups with the ability to grow quite quickly.

“That remains, but we have much more demand for larger corporate teams. It won't be their head office, but they might want to get office space outside of London.

“If we can attract some of those types of companies in Maidenhead, I think it’s a good thing for the town centre.”

The different sites each offer something different in terms of style and budget, he said.

Will added that Proxima will allow companies to ‘better plan and upscale or downscale as their business needs evolve.’

“The way people are working has changed and businesses don’t necessarily want to have huge overheads,” he said.

The future of Clyde House is uncertain, since the council is examining the idea of selling the land, which it owns.

RBWM says the buildings there have reached the end of their economic life and it would not be worth spending the money to bring them up to necessary standards.

MyWorkSpot took on Clyde House more than five years ago, and knew that Clyde House had a shelf-life at the time, David said. The company is ‘working closely with RBWM’ on this matter, he added.

“We’re always very clear with our customers in whatever we do – we’ll be communicating next steps, but no decisions have been made yet,” he said.

If Clyde House needs to be vacated, it is hoped the new Proxima site will offer a solution for those businesses using it to remain in Maidenhead.

The plan is to have the Proxima site ready this summer.

Note: The above is an updated article, published on July 12 after a more detailed interview with MyWorkSpot. An original version was published on July 11.