Ryan Brennecke / The BulletinRyan Swagerty, clockwise from top, Becky Boyd and Scott Ross work at their desks on Monday afternoon at Tenthirty Coworking in Bend.

The list of people waiting for a desk in the BendTECH co-working space at 1001 SW Emkay Drive is so long, and so unchanging, manager Tierney O’Dea figures many on it have found another place.

But other co-working spaces in Bend, including The Wilds, which is geared toward artists, are also full or nearly full. Independent workers are slowly finding their way to a new co-working space that opened downtown in August, and O’Dea is recruiting tenants for another space in the works on Southwest Emkay Drive.

Freelance book-cover designer Jason Gabbert opened Tenthirty Coworking at 1030 NW Bond St. in August after six years of working out of coffee shops. Fourteen of 21 desks are still available in the renovated office space, which is on the second level of a building next door to Deschutes Brewery’s pub. The finishes hint at Gabbert’s design background with exposed brick, white desks and red chairs.

Not far from BendTECH, Portland developer Jeffrey Reaves is renovating an office building at 1015 SW Emkay Drive that will include about a dozen co-working offices on a portion of the ground floor, said O’Dea, who is helping recruit tenants for the building, dubbed Edge Side.

Cascade Divide data centers eventually plans to tear down the building that houses a co-working space on Southwest Columbia Street, but Chairman John Warta said that’s at least two years in the future. “We intend to keep that co-working space going as long as we can,” he said.

The redevelopment will likely be a mix of apartments or condominiums and offices, he said.

Unlike living with roommates, sharing office space with strangers isn’t exactly a money-saver. Monthly rent for a desk at Tenthirty Coworking and at Cascade Co-Working is $225.

Warta said co-working rates reflect the rising cost of real estate in Bend, where traditional office space rents for as much as $1.50 per square foot.

At that rate, a 5-foot-long desk would occupy no more than $40 worth of floor space, but O’Dea said co-working is a different business model. “It’s more office-as-a-service,” she said.

Workers can show up 24-7 with their computers and find internet service, printers and conference space ready to go, O’Dea said. They also find much more flexibility than in traditional office leases. Cascade Co-Working requires a three-month commitment, and then switches to month-to-month, Warta said. Tenthirty leases desks on a monthly basis, Gabbert said.

That flexibility is what will set apart the offices in the co-working space at Edge Side, O’Dea said. The floor plan calls for about a dozen offices, which will be suited to startups, O’Dea said. Edge Side is in the midst of renovation, so the opening date is still to be determined, she said.

Gabbert said he’s met so many freelance and remote workers like himself in Bend coffee shops over the years, he felt confident opening Tenthirty without a firm measure of the demand for co-working.

Gabbert and his wife, illustrator Connie Gabbert, are both tenants. His main motivation was to create a workplace away from home, where he could throw an office Christmas party, he said. “It was more a space for us, and to be involved in the community.”

— Reporter: 541-617-7860,

kmclaughlin@bendbulletin.com