Coworking firm Gather to open first Innsbrook outpost

From left: Gather co-owners James Crenshaw, Polly White and Doug White outside the coworking brand’s upcoming eighth location at 4101 Cox Road in Innsbrook. (Courtesy Gather)

After finding fertile ground for its coworking business in Short Pump, Gather is looking to double down in western Henrico.

The local coworking chain plans to open its first Innsbrook location in a 19,000-square-foot space at 4101 Cox Road next spring.

The new outpost, near the intersection of Broad Street and Cox Road, would operate alongside Gather’s nearby, existing spot at West Broad Village.

The Innsbrook space, which will be called Gather West End, would have capacity for more than 300 people and is planned to feature more than 90 private offices of varying sizes. The location also is planned to have open workspaces, eight conference rooms, facilities to record video and podcasts, and a 30-person training room.

Gather is opening the new space to further tap into the demand it has experienced at its West Broad Village location since opening there a few years ago. That demand, which has occasionally resulted in wait-listing prospective users, has grown since the COVID-19 pandemic and comes amid the increased popularity of remote work in recent years, Gather CMO James Crenshaw said.

“We opened Short Pump in 2018, and it took off very quickly and has remained mostly full since we opened it,” he said. “Going into COVID, the demand was already there for this area of town. Now, after the economy has shifted toward more remote work, there’s even more demand.”

Crenshaw said Gather’s seven existing locations have seen a rise in remote workers who are employed by out-of-town firms and want a dedicated workspace. Those workers have augmented the ranks of Gather’s traditional membership of small firms, contractors and large companies that use the coworking spaces as local offices.

“We have the same amount of demand from the small businesses and freelancers that made up our members, along with a few Fortune 500 companies. That has been complemented by an influx of remote workers who work for a Fortune 500 company or a foreign company,” Crenshaw said. “While working at home is convenient and very flexible, many people still prefer the option to go into an office, to shut a door and focus.”

4101 Cox Road. (Courtesy Highwoods)

The Innsbrook location will be Gather’s eighth coworking space and will push the company north of 100,000 square feet of rentable workspace under its banner in the Richmond area.

The new outpost would be the first Gather location to open since 2020, when the company unveiled its Midlothian location in the Winterfield Crossing development. It also has locations in the Scott’s Addition and Arts District neighborhoods of Richmond, as well as in Virginia Beach, Norfolk and Newport News.

The Innsbrook location will occupy the entire second floor of the Highwoods Properties-owned office building at Cox Road and Innslake Drive. Gather expects to spend more than $3 million to build out and equip the new location, Crenshaw said.

UrbanCore Construction is the project’s general contractor. Tymoff+Moss Architects has been tapped to handle the architectural design, and Campfire & Co. will handle the interior design.

In addition to offices and conference rooms, the location will be Gather’s first to feature a video recording room. The idea is to provide dedicated space with soundproofing and lighting equipment, but to leave it to members to provide their own video equipment. The Innsbrook Gather is planned to have space for podcast recording as well, in line with other existing locations.

“Our members are in wide-ranging industries, and we have a lot of people who produce their own content,” Crenshaw said.

Like Gather’s other coworking spaces, the new Henrico outpost will have a communal kitchen and hold professional and social events for members.

Founded in 2014, Gather says it has more than 3,000 members across its locations. The company is owned by Crenshaw, Duke Dodson, Doug and Polly White, and Andy Beach and Jeff Bunch of UrbanCore.

The Whites said after taking a hit during the pandemic, Gather’s business rebounded immediately in 2021 and has been cash-flow positive ever since.

“We are typically less expensive than a commercial real estate lease and typically much more flexible,” Doug White said.

Annual memberships to Gather start at $250 per month, according to the company’s website. It also offers a pay-as-you-go plan that starts at $95 per month.

Building occupied by Gather’s downtown location listed for sale

The Gather-anchored building recently hit the market. (Mike Platania photo)

Meanwhile, the Dodson-owned building that houses Gather’s downtown Richmond location recently hit the market.

Dodson said his Dodson Development Group listed the roughly 32,000-square-foot building at 309-317 E. Broad St. for sale to test the market for a “stable, well-performing asset.”

The building is fully leased to a variety of commercial users that are expected to remain in place. It’s anchored by Gather and also has SinnerG Tattoos, Metro PCS and Ember Music Hall as tenants.

Dodson bought and renovated the buildings in the late 2010s and Gather moved in in 2019. Ember opened last year as a roughly 400-person venue from LX Group.

“We have significant term remaining with a great roster of commercial tenants, so we wanted to test the market to see what the appetite for a deal like this was at this point,” Dodson said in an email.

No asking price is included in the listing, which is being handled by Palmer Wilkins and Clint Greene of Dodson Commercial, the company’s brokerage division. The city most recently assessed 309-317 E. Broad St. at a combined $5.5 million.

BizSense reporter Mike Platania contributed to this story.