The Company
Vast Coworking Group is the world’s largest franchise coworking company and encompasses three prominent brands, Venture X, Office Evolution and Intelligent Office. They provide comprehensive solutions, industry expertise and a range of shared services tailored to meet the unique needs of the flexible workspace franchise community. Vast Coworking Group operates under the United Franchise Group (UFG).
The Challenge
Lack of integration
Without a connected solution that tied in all aspects of doing business including financial accounting and member services, a portion of the Denver franchise locations faced numerous challenges to operate efficiently. Working between systems was difficult for coworking staff and members alike, including a lack of branding without a white label option.
The Solution
Yardi Kube
Vast Coworking streamlines flex space management and improves scalability on a single connected platform with Yardi Kube. The solution empowers the company to automate admin, billing and lead generation, enhance communication and services with branded integrated portals for members, prospects and operators and get real-time reporting for actionable insights. Yardi Kube also delivers a robust IT management platform. And with Yardi Kube Space Management Pro connected to Yardi Voyager, the company also gains enterprise-level financial management.
The Story
An integrated system that’s easy to use
Channen Smith is a franchise owner of twelve Venture X and Office Evolution sites in the Denver area that serve a range of members from small businesses to large companies. According to Smith, “We chose Yardi Kube primarily because Office Evolution was already using it. We decided Yardi (including Yardi Kube) provides the best overall solutions because they are integrated, easy to use and great for our members. Using one system is so much easier than using several different ones.”
Smith appreciates that Yardi Kube IT Management allows employees to log in and see information about members and all operational aspects with the ability to make updates in real-time as needed. From a member standpoint, the system is easy to use and provides clear directions along with the ability to see who is in the office. Smith added that members from any of their twelve sites or any of the many Vast Coworking sites across the nation can come to their locations. Employees can look them up and verify their membership, and when it comes to selling memberships, that transparency and access give the company a competitive advantage since locations are shared and members have access to spaces in Denver as well as around the country.
A scalable full-business solution
According to Smith, one of the most fantastic things about Yardi is scalability. He explained that each time the company added a new location, transferring the chart of accounts and all other information from existing sites made opening a new one very simple and easy for the entire management team.
Smith also uses Yardi Voyager and Yardi Procure to Pay for integration from point of sale all the way to financials and reporting, which enables them to control costs and monitor revenue from members. Vendors can sign up and log in to VendorCafe to submit bids and more, and the company can run all of its expenses seamlessly through Voyager.
One of the unexpected benefits of using Yardi solutions, according to Smith, is the visitor management system. The self-service system lets members efficiently check in using a tablet to find contacts, appointments and meeting locations.
Enhanced collaboration and cost savings
The biggest cost savings using Voyager and Yardi Kube together, according to Smith, has been Voyager’s backend capabilities and ability to track all expenses with an automated approval workflow for each employee to follow, which prevents unauthorized spending. “We have avoided spending thousands of dollars that can happen with miscommunication,” said Smith.
As for revenue enhancements, Yardi Kube integrates with the company’s web portal as well as third-party systems and automates transaction workflows so customers can log in and purchase directly from the website rather than call customer service and initiate a process that ends with manual data entry back into the system. “This has been a huge win for us, as far as revenue and streamlining the sales process and reducing our costs,” enthused Smith.
Excellent support and positioning for growth
Working with Yardi has been an excellent experience for Smith and his staff across locations. “Yardi listens to us and takes our enhancement requests seriously. In the near future, we anticipate upgrading to Voyager 8 to enjoy the latest capabilities of the platform. We’re also excited about enhancements for visitor management and member interfaces which all provide further benefits for our members and employees,” said Smith.
Smith believes the future of coworking is looking very bright and is excited about the growth of the flex space community and overall industry. “Many people are moving away from traditional office space but are still looking for well-designed and equipped places to work. Having Yardi Kube to enhance the member experience has been really great overall for the industry and the growth of our business,” said Smith.
