A new coworking space opened in downtown Waco earlier this month, giving entrepreneurs a workspace and mentoring opportunities.
A community collaborative called Start Up Waco founded Hustle, opened a few weeks ago.
Waco-McLennan County Economic Development Corporation contributed $750,000 to help build the space.
Baylor University Associate Vice President for External Affairs and Start Up Waco Board Member Jeremy Vickers said Hustle aims to help businesses become successful.
"The gap that we fill here at Hustle is the physical location to have them grow their businesses, help launch new initiatives and expand them but also all of those pieces that they are missing so they can come here and become significant contributors to the economy," Vickers said.
Hustle currently has 11 tenants at the location, including Cedar + Black Digital Media. Co-founder Umar Brimah who launched the agency eight months ago has enjoyed sharing his workspace with other entrepreneurs at Hustle.
"As soon as we moved in here, we all noticed an increase in morale and an increase in creativity, just by the people we were surrounded by. From that we learned that is a lot about the environment that you are in that helps produce fruitful ideas," Brimah said.
He added they have received other added benefits from renting a space at the new hub.
"Hustle gave us that perfect package where we could come in and have our own office space. We also have access to conference rooms, presentation rooms. We access to printers, print shops and also mentorship," Brimah said.
Programs and resources are also available for entrepreneurs who are not renting a workspace at Hustle.
A downtown market study completedlast summer highlighted the need for office space in downtown Waco.
According to City Center Waco Executive Director Megan Henderson, coworking spaces like Hustle and WacoWorkmay end up bringing more offices to the downtown area in the future because the startups may eventually grow beyond the shared walls.
"We would certainly expect several of those to spin up, move out into bigger office space and that the number of firms in downtown Waco would expand," Henderson said.
Brimah hopes someday his business can have its own downtown location and satellite offices in other Texas cities.
"Waco is a fast growing city and we feel if we can get it when it's starting to hit that apex in growth, we can grow simultaneously with it," Brimah said.
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