A man walks into a WeWork space in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, U.S., October 4, 2019. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri/Files
WeWork executives used to obsess over the number of people they could pack into each of the company’s shared workspaces.
They said a more crowded office helped make the space feel active and spark collaboration when desk mates slid past each other in the hallways. The technique had an added benefit of maximising revenue from each co-working office.
It took only a few weeks and a global pandemic for that strategy to become a deterrent for customers and a major liability for a company that can’t afford further setbacks.
The vast majority of WeWork offices remain open, though with far fewer people coming in than before. Offices that have shuttered only did so when explicitly ordered by authorities or after a confirmed case of a Covid-19 infection.
Even then, locations are typically closed for an overnight cleaning and reopened the next day.
