Today, citizenM started marketing a new proposition, a corporate subscription, targeting remote professionals that need a base in the city to escape so now and then from their apartment for a meeting, a day of work, or a night of sleep
We got onto this idea of corporate subscriptions through our MD Development & Investments in the US, Ernest Lee. He is in frequent contact with corporate real estate planners and called me one day and said: “Let's get on the phone with some of these large companies' real estate folks and see how they are thinking about the future of work”.
In these conversations it became very clear to us, that not only smaller companies went fully distributed but also the big tech boys are permanently allowing HQ staff to be located further from the headquarters than ever
And that it might be a great idea for someone living in Seattle and working in San Francisco to have access to AND hotel rooms when they visit San Francisco, but also a space to open your laptop if the house next door gets refurbished, or you need to come into a city for a meeting with a colleague or client dinner.
On this basis we set up the corporate subscription. It is, for now, targeting people that work remote but need or want to be in the big cities occasionally. Obviously when people travel freely again in six months to one year, it also becomes interesting as a base deal for corporates or individual with frequent travel needs.
The fixed price per month is for all locations and is lower than the lowest corporate deal we have in normal situations, if you only look at nights.
But what is really below all of this, is the desire of a company to have a proposition for mobile citizens of the world that cannot be transacted through the purchase of hotel rooms but through longer term partnerships.
This product is at the moment in MVP status and has limited spots available. In the background we have taken some manual shortcuts to make it seamless through our (new) app.
So here is the elevator pitch:
To those workers, who are working from home for the last six months, and realise they will not be back in the office full time anytime soon.
To the companies, that realise that the time to have centralised prime real estate offices are gone, and are looking for smarter ways to empower their workforce.
To the recruiters, that realise that it pays off to not have to recruit for people to move into the expensive cities of London, Paris, New York and Boston, but still want to give a huge secondary benefit to new hires,
For a fixed monthly fee (£500/€550/$600), come work unlimited in all our locations, access our spectacular rooftop bars, and get three room nights (inc breakfast and drink) and meeting room use included. All handled through our new app with direct access to a dedicated support team to help you with all your planning.
What do you think, is it time to change the dynamics of travel, commute and office use?