Located in Downtown Bloomington, Indiana, Dimension Mill (The Mill) is home to over 100 freelancers, remote-workers and entrepreneurs. Here’s what Community Manager Jessika Griffin has to say about their new space!

When did you open your coworking space and what enticed you to do so?  

Dimension Mill opened in October 2018 and is a part of a larger project, the Trades District, in Downtown Bloomington, Indiana. We started The Mill to support and provide a physical home for the rapidly growing entrepreneur, remote worker, and innovation communities. We want local entrepreneurs to launch and accelerate companies [in order to] to create jobs and increase wages.

 

Tell us about your space. How big is it? What kinds of amenities do you have? What sort of quirks make it special?

Dimension Mill is in a 103-year old building, previously the Showers Brothers furniture factory. The Showers Brothers factory played a huge role in Bloomington life, and had much more progressive hiring practices than other companies in their time, including being the first furniture factory in the U.S. to hire women. We have 19,000 sq. ft. of coworking space, private offices, and dedicated event space.

What is your favorite thing about operating a coworking space?

Seeing organic connections happen every day. It’s amazing to watch a community develop right in front of your eyes and exciting to play a role in facilitating those connections.

 

What has been the most surprising/unexpected thing about operating a coworking space?

People love to help each other. Just experiencing the close proximity in a shared office space allows people to make friends, help each other on projects, and share resources. There’s a lot of un-exciting work to make a coworking space successful, but the payoff for the community is huge.

 

What’s your favorite story about one of your members?

Anne was an amazing member of the Cowork Btown community (the community before it evolved into The Mill) and has been a huge help in transitioning members throughout Dimension Mill’s acquisition of Cowork Btown. Anne’s sister lived in Bloomington, teaching at Indiana University and had been trying to convince her to move to Bloomington for years. In 2015 while visiting, her sister showed her Cowork Btown while it was at its second location on Walnut Street. Anne was impressed and since she and her husband telecommuted anyway, they sold their home in Chicago, packed up their cat Curtis, and moved to Bloomington, at which time Cowork Btown was in its third location on Rogers Street in the historic Frosted Foods building.

 

What is your biggest piece of advice for someone wanting to open a space?

Find your champions before you start. You will need help in all sorts of ways that you didn’t anticipate.