Hire Space Team

Follow the progress of London's most exciting venue hire website

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Venue of the Week - Push Studios

Hi again everyone.

It is our pleasure to announce that this week’s Venue of the Week title belongs to the brilliant Push Studios. 

Offering fabulously flexible studio space in East Dulwich, Push Studios are suitable for workshops, first aid courses, parties, promotional events, martial arts, tap classes, flamenco classes, personal training… in fact, you name it, Push Studios can probably host it. Fully equipped with an impressive array of kit including the mysteriously named ‘Gravitron Machine’ – not, we are assured, stolen from CERN – Push Studios is a real find and we’re confident it will soon be one of Hire Space’s most popular venues.

Managed by Johnny Woodbine (Mr Wow), Push Studios pride themselves on outstanding customer service. ‘Clients find the atmosphere at Push Studios friendly and fun. Unlike other gyms, we give our clients a really personal experience’. This commitment to going the extra mile is also reflected in the extensive programme of events run by Push Studios themselves. Ranging from charity Zumbathons to coffee mornings, the dos held by the Push Team are fun and welcoming, and help to account for their extremely loyal customer base.

Speaking about Hire Space, Johnny says he found it ‘quick and easy’ to create a profile for Push Studios on Hire Space. He says ‘the website is clear, informative and dynamic. Our account manager is helpful, efficient and will always go out of her way to find solutions to any queries we may have.’ And (we’re glad to say) the feeling’s mutual. We’re delighted to be working with Push Studios and can’t wait to help them make maximum use of their spaces.

Whether the idea of a Zumbathon has got you hot under the collar, or the coffee morning is more your (ahem) cup of tea, feel free to get in touch if you’d like to know more.

Have a great weekend!

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Hire Space biscuits on the Hire Space blog. I'm hungry. http://bit.ly/PEso2Y http://on.fb.me/Sruw0t

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Hire Space Biscuits

Hi everyone, One of the many things we've learnt from our esteemed backers, the founders of early dot-com success story TopTable.com, is that we should always reward our users handsomely for their loyalty. Our venues are rewarded in obvious ways. They get loads more bookings, a beautiful profile and American-style customer service at all times. (If you have any doubt about the excellence of the latter, by the way, call up any US business and start asking stupid questions. I promise, they'll never hang up. Ask medical insurance companies for Obama's mobile number, for instance, or call the State Department to request info on the best way to travel from Parson's Green to Fulham Broadway. Think of it as market research.) For the booking public, though, with whom we'll have much less direct interaction and fewer opportunities to show off our carefully-honed telephone manner, we decided they needed something extra. It isn't enough to have a delectable range of venues and a level of convenience never previously known. We needed something to keep people coming back again and again: a reason beyond all others. That reason, we decided after long discussions, is Hire Space Biscuits. That's right, Hire Space Biscuits. Like air miles, or Sainsbury's nectar points, or Tesco's clubcard points.......but biscuits. Think about it. Book enough venues and you'll soon have enough biscuits to book even more venues free of charge. Or, perhaps, to buy something completely different. Whatever it is, it'll be great and it'll be free. And the best part of all, you'll also be presented with a platter of real life biscuits to share with (or hide from) your friends. Have a look at Delia and Jane in the photo below. Delia and Jane work for the Gestalt Centre in East London. They were so excited by the prospect of Hire Space biscuits that we decided we had to give them some. And, even better, they loved them.

So next time you want to book a venue, consider your options. You could trawl through internet sites for an hour before finding a shortlist of places you like, then call them up, only to be told in very un-American terms that they are not available at that time anyway. Or..........that's right...........you could book through Hire Space and earn a platter of biscuits. What more could you want? You've already got the best venue booking website ever, and now you've got this to boot. You won't just be able to book venues easily when Hire Space launches, you’llactually be rewarded for it. As ever, we'd be keen to hear your feedback. When someone bravely suggested "biscuits" from the back of the ideas room, the Hire Space Team were somewhat taken aback and I assume your initial reaction will be similar. We hope, though, that the concept will soon become as familiar to you as a rainy London morning, and you'll be eagerly booking venues to secure those biscuits. So let us know what you think. Drop us a line at [email protected]. Looking forward to it! Crunch crunch.

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A blog on internships by Makie, Hire Space intern - http://bit.ly/QBixeW Enjoy the weekend everybody http://bit.ly/LeIH9Y

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Good initiative but are schools doing enough to make use of their facilities out of hours? Keep the developers at bay with www.hirespace.com! http://bit.ly/QUxGJv http://bit.ly/LeIH9Y

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Another big themed party in Belgium - http://bit.ly/QpeMes Anyone know of any 1970s themed festivals in the UK? If not we should probably start some. http://bit.ly/LeIH9Y

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Some of the many extras you'll soon be able to book on www.hirespace.com http://on.fb.me/WoXEZA

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Anise Gallery on Shad Thames is this week's Venue of the Week. Have a look at the www.hirespace.com blog - http://bit.ly/PEso2Y Enjoy the weekend! http://on.fb.me/Rha3Ky

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Venue of the Week - Anise Gallery

Hello everybody. It's that time of the week again. A profile of the latest in an esteemed line of London venues, all with sumptuous spaces and each waiting patiently to be booked out, time and time again, by the insatiable masses once Hire Space goes live.  This week it's Anise Gallery, located on the picuresque, cobbled street of Shad Thames just east of Tower Bridge. It is a truly fascinating area, and as a side point, concentration not being a strong point, I highly recommend the Museum of London Docklands situated over the river, which I visited last week and which documents in compelling fashion the rapid trade-driven rise of the famous City of London.

Anise Gallery itself was formerly Anise Warehouse and is primarily a place to display art, and particularly art with a strong architectural feel. With a unique backdrop of exquisite art work, original features and Thames side location, it's ideal for evening receptions and events. No surprise then that it's already making a name for itself. With its passionate owners holding bimonthly private views, talks and events, there's plenty of buzz around the place. Get in touch with Jacquelyn on 07808 864653 if you'd like to find out more - she's always happy to help.

Naturally,  Jacquelyn is excited at the prospect of finding new people to benefit from the gallery through Hire Space, and notes the ease with which venue profiles can be created, particularly "with the help of the Hire Space team." Her advice is to review your profile before publishing, as there's always a way to make it even better than it previously was, and so get even more people up for booking away.  Good news all round, then. Lots more Londoners soon to visit a great new space. Galleries like this are ideal for Hire Space, and we'll be welcoming a whole load more of them onto the site before launch. If you've got paintings to display, then get in touch. And if you haven't, then get drawing. Have a great weekend everybody.  

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Have a look at Hire Space's twitter feed - @hirespace All the latest venues, news and updates You'll never not know what's going on! http://on.fb.me/RRMCKB

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Great initiative as our Olympic heroes tour schools and sports clubs. Inspire a generation! http://bit.ly/SRqEnh http://bit.ly/LeIH9Y

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Great new venue. Not on www.hirespace.com. Yet. Going to ask @ashleycole to tweet his support http://bbc.in/OQgw3k http://bit.ly/LeIH9Y

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The www.hirespace.com blog with the excellent Hackney Pirates as Venue of the Week - http://bit.ly/PEso2Y Have a good weekend everyone. http://on.fb.me/UnfNsE

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Venue of the Week - Hackney Pirates

We are delighted to announce that this week’s ‘Venue of the Week’ title belongs to the fantastic Hackney Pirates. Described as an ‘unconventional learning environment – weird, exciting and inspiring’ by Founding Director Catriona Maclay, Hackney Pirates is a wonderfully eccentric space that offers a creative environment for young people and adults alike.

Whilst providing a fun and engaging setting for kids, with an emphasis on “learning but not about school,” Catriona goes on to outline their adult appeal; ‘We run away days, so strategy days, where teams of people who struggle to find time as a team together in the office can come to a different space to talk about the big questions that they need to focus on in their company, and that’s great to have in the Ideas Room because you can draw all over the walls.’ The Ideas Room is a personal favourite of ours here at Hire Space; we are currently looking in to developing one for Hire Space HQ.

Hackney Pirates offers a quirky surrounding that encourages a fresh perspective; as Catriona puts it “where else in London can you have a meeting in a Pirate Den?”  The space is completely unique; it’s very intricately designed but is also functional. It’s got everything you’d usually expect from a professional meeting space but it will surprise and inspire every visitor that comes to it.

With such a fantastic venue, Catriona admits it is a shame to see it left “sitting unused most of the day.” However she is excited to see how the benefits of Hire Space can maximise the full potential at Hackney Pirates; ‘Hire Space does all of the bits that would have been too hard for us. It’s just a wonderfully practical, simple way of you doing something at scale that we can’t possibly learn to do.”

By Alex Picton, Hire Space Venue Liasion Officer

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Great news for small music venues - http://bbc.in/O0qNs1 http://bit.ly/LeIH9Y

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The Hire Space blog - social media week and a man in a strange t-shirt. Have a good weekend everybody - http://bit.ly/KZzo8Y http://on.fb.me/PKwVTO

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London gets social

London gets Social

We are coming to the end of what has been a truly inspiring couple of days in London. Social Media Week has come at the perfect time, just as the post-Olympic blues was beginning to set in, when as a collective we were about to go back to hiding behind copies of the Metro, once again avoiding the stares of those sitting opposite on the tube, muttering angrily at anyone who looked even slightly like a tourist. Just as we were about to return to these old ways Social Media Week has brought, funnily enough, a distinctively social turn to London. Anyone that has been to a session will have been struck by the positivity around the week, as a group who do not often get together have shared their experiences of what is fast becoming one of business's most important new frontiers. Sessions have covered everything from how to use social media to increase exports, to how the tool is imperative to using Crowdfunding (a tool that everyone from businesses to musicians are using to access new investment).

Amongst the many sessions the Hire Space team popped into, one was particularly relevant to our business. The Sharing Economy ‘Commercial Reality Throw-down’ which was organised by the team behind The People Who Shareand had a fantastic panel of experts from dominant brand names (M&S) to emerging web stars (Airbnb). 

The session looked at what opportunities lay ahead for the idea of a Sharing Economy. (Wandering what the sharing economy is and how Hire Space fits into it? See our blog on Collaborative Consumption, the Sharing Economy's namesake, below). The session drew out some really interesting questions, including how mainstay brands could support their customers to share more and consume less and whether a sharing economy has to be asymmetrical - i.e. do you need to share with me for me to share with you? The general consensus was that sharing could be one-sided, sites such as Go Carshare being a clear example. 

Lastly the question was raised as to whether there exists a market for the sharing economy outside of the developed world. For instance in China, where purchasing new possessions represents an ascendancy to greater wealth, is there room for sharing? Again the panel was largely unanimous; although these markets represent huge opportunities for retailers like Marks and Spencer who sell goods in the traditional way they are also, conversely,  probably the biggest market for the sharing economy. For it is on these less developed economies that ideas like Go Carshare and Hire Space are based, economies in which co-operative ownership is a necessity rather than a luxury, where one has to find a cousin to couchsurf with and where buildings are schools by day and further education spaces by night. 

Whether these economies will go through the same cycle of sharing to commercialism and then back to a hybrid of sharing and commercialism, or can skip this middle step altogether will be very interesting indeed, and something we will of course be watching very closely at Hire Space HQ.

If you're interested in the seminar you can view it here

Meanwhile, have a look at Hire Space marketing man Reuben in his I will give up my seat for links SEO t-shirtSEOt-shirt on his way to yet another Social Media Week event …apparently other SEOs will get it… 

Enjoy the weekend.