Central Ops

“The way in which we work has changed in the last decade. Shared workspaces provide flexibility for people to grow their business without the hassle of leasing a full office, while also finding a community to meet and network.”

Central Ops, a group of shared workspaces across Melbourne, is the brainchild of friends and business partners Jack Allwood and Kyle Jarratt.

“Central Ops means central operations. We chose that name because we liked the fact that it means exactly what we were doing, which is offering a ‘centre of operations’ for business owners in shared office spaces,” explains Jack.

Central Ops started in North Melbourne a decade ago when Jack was living in the suburb and had the opportunity to take on office space.

“Kyle and I are industrial designers and product designers by trade. When we started, we were running our design business onepointsix, in a North Melbourne office that we rented cheaply from a friend. The people managing that space left, so we took over the management!” laughs Jack.

“We quickly had to figure out how to get new people into that office. We actually filled it pretty easily, but then we had to leave that spot as the building got sold. That’s when we leased our first building and brought everyone from our old office over to the new site, which we called Central Ops 1.0 at 103 Howard Street, North Melbourne.”

Kyle explains that once they started, they realised the opportunity that could come from renting unused office space to other people. As demand for their shared workspaces grew, Jack and Kyle expanded into new buildings, with a total of five sites now.

Central Ops have mostly lockable office options as well as meeting rooms and social spaces for collaboration. Their members generally own established businesses and cover a broad base of industries from consultants to designers, creatives to medical professionals. Monthly membership fees cover everything, so there are no unexpected add-on costs.

Jack and Kyle plan to keep growing their empire and are always on the hunt for new space.

“It's a Goldilocks situation - it needs to be the right type of building, the right layout, the right price, the right location, the right facilities,” says Kyle.

“We have three locations in North Melbourne because it's not as popular as some of the other inner-city suburbs, but it's actually right next to the CBD and has a lot of really great facilities. There’s Queen Victoria Markets, nice coffee shops and food spots and the free tram zone too. It’s somewhat of a hidden treasure; people who aren't familiar with North Melbourne wouldn’t know about all it has to offer.”

Words by Joyce Watts & Photography by Anna Encio