Life and Times of Bumpy Pitch Vol. 2

Office Space

Let me start this off by saying that this is the parking lot outside of our office where we are supposed to be able to park. See how empty it is? Just a couple of dudes looking at some sort of crane apparatus thing.

But no parked cars in there...

There will be filming taking place in the building shortly.

I have a love / hate relationship with our office. I love the space. I love the location and how it is situated right in between our manufacturer and our print house. I love the coffee shop and the cafe at the end of the block and I love the views of the skyline of downtown LA directly out of our window. I love that I can take the train downtown and then skateboard form the station to our office.

This is our first real office. We had another one but it was technically a shared space (even though our friend we shared it with lived in another country). But anyway, this is ours. This is where we have conversations that lead to new products or events. Where friends and colleagues stop by to watch a game and chat about things. It's a place where my dog can come to work with me. So many good things about this space.

But then there is the other side. We happen to have set up shop in an area in Los Angeles where there is a constant stream of filming. Commercials. Movies. TV shows. You name it, it is probably filmed in our building or in the surrounding streets.

Example 1

This Samsung commercial was filmed in our building. 

What does all this mean? Well, for one thing, it means that the majority of the time we can't park. Not just in the lot outside the building where we should get to park. But on the streets as well. They are shut down more than they are open. Film crews, production trailers and people on walkie-talkies have pretty much taken over the area.

This might not seem like a huge deal. In fact, in the beginning, it might seem cool that one of your favorite TV shows is being filmed outside the door to your office. It might seem cool that there are some interesting actors and famous people chilling on the couch outside your office. But this is not the case! Don't be fooled by this. This is actually a huge pain in the ass.

The amount of times that we can't park here. The times we can't walk to the bathroom on our floor because there is a scene being filmed and no how no way can we interrupt that scene (never mind they interrupt us all day long). Being told to be quiet in our own office. Or to hush while we walk through a shared space.

It's all a bit much.

And it's one thing that we never really imagined or expected when we moved in here. And that, I think, is part of the entrepreneurs daily dilemna. We often times don't know what we are getting into. We don't have departments that go out and look at commercial real estate space and assess what it would be like to work there. We don't have a department with deep knowledge of the local real estate scene that can guide us as we look for office space.

We just found something that we thought suited us, that fit the budget and a place where we want to spend long hours working away.

This office is that on so many levels. So we went with it, not knowing some of the realities that come with the building and office space. It's an amazing place that I love coming to work at.

Just not when the parking lot is closed off and there are zombies in costume roaming the building.

The photo below is from about 30 minutes after the empty parking lot photo was taken. Production trucks and personnel have taken over. This is usually a pretty good time to break out.