The Dealership In Shaker Heights Caters To Startups And Freelancers

Simone Cameron has a thing for hashtags. As owner and founder of Annek Group, a social media marketing firm, she knows it’s a great way to create connections. 

“The more hashtags on social, the better,” says Cameron. “Especially on Instagram. I hashtag ‘CLE,’ all day, every day.”

Wearing a black tee and khakis, she’s addressing 17 note-taking business owners as part of a weekly Lunch and Learn seminar at the Dealership in Shaker Heights. The free Wednesday forums are part of the offerings at the auto-dealership-turned-co-working-space for freelancers, entrepreneurs and startups. 

With 22 private offices, communal workstations and a 13,000-square-foot garage that hosts architects and a greenhouse maker, the Dealership provides affordable office space, educational programming and a place to grow fledgling networks. 

For five years, the former Lee Road space had been home to LaunchHouse, a business accelerator that generated a lot of buzz but not the economic impact the city expected. So in June 2016, Shaker Heights City Council didn’t renew LaunchHouse’s lease. Shaker Heights Development Corp. took over the lease and the operations of the building, while LaunchHouse eventually relocated to Highland Heights. 

“Shaker has historically been a bedroom community,” says Nick Fedor, executive director of Shaker Heights Development. He thinks the Dealership can be an important component for economic change. “Sure, we want Shaker to become more vibrant,” he says, “but really we’re just providing space for people to just grow.”

The approach is less high-churn accelerator and more low-pressure incubator that attracts a spectrum of small businesses from lawyers to freelance designers.

Tenants pay between $125 and $500 per month for co-working space up to furnished private offices. Everyone receives high-speed Internet, 24/7 key fob entry and access to private meeting and conference rooms.

Jumar Newell, a 30-year-old video and graphic designer, relocated from a tiny office in Garfield Heights in November to a small studio for its affordability and opportunities for in-house collaboration. 

“I had to move out of my home because my 2-year-old daughter took over the space,” he says. 

There are trade-offs, though. While his studio is noisier than his former space, the environment is more energetic. 

“I can take on high volumes of business and network like crazy,” he says. “After all, my exposure is higher.”

With Shaker Heights Development’s offices located in the Dealership, Fedor gets a firsthand look at how the co-working concept and its ever-changing roster of tenants, projects and ideas breeds an atmosphere of community and innovation. 

“The working world is a little more nuanced nowadays,” Fedor says. “I don’t think people here want that 9-to-5, watercooler-conversation kind of place, but one where they can simply meet like-minded people, collaborate and even make a deal or two.”