Flex office firm Industrious is seeing major growth

A version of this article first appeared in the CNBC Property Play newsletter with Diana Olick. Property Play covers new and emerging opportunities for real estate investors, from individuals to venture capitalists, private equity funds, family offices, institutional investors and large public companies. become a member to receive future editions straight to your inbox.

One year ago commercial real estate giant CBRE acquired flexible office company Industrious, which opened its first office in 2013 and grew at an impressive pace after the pandemic.

At the time, CBRE said in a statement that Industrious’ success was “the result of ongoing investment in understanding what makes a great workplace, combined with continuous operational improvement.”

And it was a fair bet. According to the company, Industrious increased its global footprint by 58% in 2025 over 2024, and more than 250 units are now open in more than 100 cities. A 100% growth in new transfers is predicted in 2026.

Industrious currently ranks third in its industry in terms of number of spaces and total square metres, behind International Workplace Group (which owns Regus) and WeWork.

According to SkyQuest, the value of the global flexible office market will increase from $54.59 billion in 2025 to $147.2 billion in 2033.

While the mainstream office sector is still slowly recovering from the impact of the pandemic and the new work-from-home culture, flexible offices that include co-working spaces are benefiting from this slow recovery. Big companies want people back in the office, but they’re also increasingly focusing on the workplace experience of those who don’t work at headquarters.

“I would say the biggest thing driving this is companies focusing on upgrading their medium and small offices to the quality level of their hub city so people don’t leave for a competitor and they need help with that,” said Jamie Hodari, founder and CEO of Industrious. “It’s really hard, even for JPMorgan or Google, to deliver a really nice, engaging office experience for 43 people.”

Hodari said there are large cities with a lot of office space, as well as smaller cities and regions with very little space. This has a direct impact on the flexible office model.

“There are a lot of people who want to work near where they live. They want to bike to work. They want to walk to work. They want to drive five minutes to work,” Hodari said.

Of Industrious’s last 50 coworking space openings, a disproportionate number are in neighborhoods, not major central business districts.

Landlords of Class B office buildings, which still have high vacancies, are also turning to renewing their properties in order to attract new tenants. Industrious is able to benefit from this thanks to its business model that is different from other flexible office companies.

Rather than leasing entire buildings, Industrious acts more like a hotel management company. The company signs management agreements with landlords to operate part of a building. Instead of paying monthly rent to the landlord, he split the profit and also the risk. This “asset-light” approach makes Industrious more resilient during economic downturns because it is not tied to large, long-term lease payments.

Industrious specializes in a more hospitality-focused environment, building spaces that resemble boutique hotels more than traditional offices. It also attracts a more diverse tenant.

“There’s a lot more people coming into the building doing cool things, and so we hear all the time from landlords: ‘Hey, I own this whole building, half of it is rented, I want to use the rest. How can I make the lobby not feel like a no-man’s land?'” said Anna Squires Levine, president of Industrious.

Industrious is having better times in the office market right now, and Levine said he doesn’t see any trouble from weak employment reports. But the risks of yawning can be huge.

“This is an industry that overperforms in good times and underperforms in bad times,” Hodari said. “So when things are good you’re going to do better than long-term renting, and when you get into a recession or something like Covid happens, long-term renting can drop by 6% or 10%, and elasticity can drop by 25%.”