Locating an office out of the town centre can have significant benefits for staff and for the efficient running of the business. There are a number of factors to take into account that can drive the decision to locate on the edge of a town or city.
Most new office developments are in locations that offer excellent communication links. In many cases they will be in close proximity to motorways or railway stations, which allow staff to easily commute to work. This is in sharp contrast with sitting endlessly in queues of traffic trying to get to a city centre location. Even public transport cannot offer the same advantages as a commute to work by bicycle or car to a location with plenty of free parking on one of the many new landscaped business parks around our towns and cities. With a less stressful commute, staff arrive fresh and ready to work.
Out of town does not mean away from facilities – far from it. With many well-developed retail outlets and shopping centres on the outskirts of town, it can be easier for staff to go shopping than if they were to be located in the city centre. Equally, if they need to get into town it can be a far easier journey during the day than at rush hour.
The vast majority of city centre offices are relatively old, making it expensive and difficult to install state of the art office furniture and infrastructure such as IT networks. Modern, fresh and spacious out of town offices are well suited to the business needs of today and the units can sometimes be made available on a modular basis meaning that expansion or sub-letting may well be a possibility.
With staff satisfaction becoming an ever more important factor in achieving customer excellence and improving loyalty, new out of town office accommodation with its spacious and modern, air conditioned facilities can be a great pull. For the same commute time, a staff member can live proportionately further away from the office than if they had to get into a city centre or use public transport. That means they can, if they wish, live further into the country or, ironically, in town centres where they would have a 'reverse commute' against the main flow of peak time traffic.
The relative explosion in the services sector has led to the rapid development of out of town office complexes. The advantage is that many businesses on the campus will be new to the area and this helps to generate a sense of community. The high headcount on many such campuses also means that budget hotels and food chains may well have established themselves close by, providing good access to sustenance and temporary accommodation for staff and visitors alike.
With landscaped surroundings and fresh air appeal, the out of town development can be a far more pleasant environment in which to work than a congested, noisy and polluted town or city centre with a stressful commute.
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