Yes, seriously: THEY ARE WORKING
Why limit the activity of your company to the four walls of your office? It's more, why limit it to a city or a country? Open the doors of your company and get out. Go out and take a vacation. Of course, in an entrepreneurial style: in search of a new experience that will enrich your project, that will allow you to see the world and, why not, that will help you take a break. Welcome to enterprising tourism.
Without fear of traveling to the other side of the world, dozens of freelancers and entrepreneurs embark on an adventure. It's about choosing an interesting destination, looking for the right establishment, **packing your bags and traveling to learn**, taking ideas and putting them into practice later in your business project.
One of these establishments is run by Carlos de la Lama Noriega , who has been working for a couple of years Silicon Valley . His entrepreneurial spirit and his desire to know and understand the business culture of other places took him to the mecca of startups.
Nevertheless, De la Lama is not the only one. In fact, today there are numerous agencies that organize trips, offer accommodation and coworking spaces designed almost exclusively for these entrepreneurs and their initiatives. But, since not everything is going to be work and undertaking, these agencies also set aside time so that, between meetings, they can take a bath in the beach or relax in the mountains.
other type of office
Startup Embassy is one of those projects. Noriega's own initiative sought to solve one of the main problems faced by the enterprising traveler in the cradle of technology companies: finding an affordable place to sleep. They are usually people who stay there between two weeks and a month, although there are also those who stay for a year.
Bearing in mind that the hotel night in Silicon Valley it can cost 150 euros, very few could afford it. However, living in "the house" of this Spaniard (with twelve beds, kitchen and space for meetings) comes to cost about 39 euros per night, which has made life easier for some 1,100 people from 50 different countries since 2012, as he himself has explained to Traveler.
Not only in Silicon Valley there are establishments like this . There are others with the same objective in very different parts of the world. Perhaps not all of them intend to take advantage of the business ecosystem of the place (because in some places it is little more than non-existent), but they do offer an escape route for entrepreneurs with light luggage who want to meet other entrepreneurs while traveling in search of good weather.
Say goodbye to the four walls
A good example is The Surf Office , based in Gran Canaria and Santa Cruz (California). Two coworking spaces with accommodation that offer a workplace, overlooking the sea, where to concentrate. Its creator is peter faber , a designer who worked in the Czech Republic until he decided to pack his bags and go to the Spanish islands in search of a good weather and comfort.
He had also traveled to Silicon Valley, where he spent weekends in Santa Cruz. He wasn't the only one. Many other startup founders traveled there on occasion , because they didn't want to be in the valley cities or San Francisco all the time. People who preferred to live on the beach and who, in just over an hour, could do their business in the right place.
MORE THAN A NEED
the entrepreneur Aline Mayard she has had to travel to many places in a short time for work reasons. He believes that experience has made him more productive, creative, and peaceful. He thought that many other companies could benefit from a different work environment than usual, so he decided to install his project, The Blue House, in Taghazout, a small coastal town in southern Morocco.
This really is taking a 'break'
His philosophy of him? “ Do not worry about anything because we prepare everything. It has become a meeting point with the optimal environment for startups like the Maptia nomad, who passed through there, have room to think and lead a healthier lifestyle and work. His programs usually last a month and take place in a venue where a handful of companies coexist, meet, create networks, share and collaborate.
Mayard believes that changing the environment resets your brain, "Ideas flow", you free yourself from everyday life , you don't need to attend pointless meetings or events you don't want to go to. In Taghazout “everything is different”. Mayard doesn't wear shoes, she wakes up and looks at the waves, she doesn't take the subway, “I work better and I feel better”. But he makes it clear that, for him, business tourism is not going on vacation, but discovering new business ideas that must be taken advantage of at all costs.
Meanwhile, Inés Silva and her project **Startup Tour** have gone through Berlin, London, Milan and Dublin. It is a travel agency that brings budding entrepreneurs closer together, allowing them to mature their ideas, find new opportunities and meet investors, incubators and accelerators. And it is that, beyond accommodation, it is essential that entrepreneurs connect with each other, “something that the hotel does not allow you. On the contrary, it isolates you, sells that isolation”, Noriega explains. The connection becomes a necessity.
Everything is different... but you work the same (or more?)
Fabor explains that the intention of this type of project is that you go to work at a place where there are ten different people who, in turn, change every week. “It is a community that attracts others.” A community that also helps the newcomer to feel good. In the end, "those who sleep in the same space, have breakfast, eat together, also do it with entrepreneurs," explains Noriega.
Working in the same coworking where you sleep means that people who until two days ago did not know each other at all can work together until three in the morning, stop to rest and even treat themselves to dinner or “have a barbecue”. So everything stays in the family and intense relationships are built, businessmen associate... But this "is like getting married: you don't marry just anyone, you don't associate with just anyone either."
In the end, these projects provide the entrepreneur with what he needs. They learn from others, find new clients… And all thanks to a shared sofa "where we can sit and share our needs."
Like family
Another experience is Carlos Hernandez , which he created together with Peter Fabor The Tech Beach, a service that, also from Gran Canaria, offers accommodation and fourteen days of work to redesign a technological product. “It allows you to continue working on your projects and at the same time live away from home and not be in an office,” he explains.
Hernández often spends time on the island and in Berlin to learn about other ways of working. “You don't do traditional tourism. You are a traveler but you don't disconnect, you don't just do leisure, it's a mix. We are enterprising travelers.”
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