Business centres provide a wide range of fully equipped meeting rooms. These rooms are available for use by both internal serviced office clients as well as external companies that just need the benefit of a professional meeting room on an adhoc basis.

So why do businesses use external meeting rooms?

A recent survey by serviced office group Avanta showed that the majority of their meeting rooms were booked by external organisations for training purposes and offsite strategy meetings.

External meeting rooms are ideal for offsite strategy meetings and training events, offering a more creative and productive atmosphere away from the familiarities of the normal office environment. Organisations can take their employees out of their day to day work surroundings to strategise and/or learn new techniques to enhance their organisation’s competitive abilities.

What are the benefits of using an external meeting room?

There are a number of benefits to using an external meeting or training room. Many companies have found having access to a variety of different sized rooms, locations and the ability to pay for them as and when they are need, helps them keep business costs to a minimum. Many business centres also offer a daily delegate rate, allowing external companies to benefit from cost effective room hire and full catering at competitive prices.

Many small and medium sized companies have also seen a number of benefits when hiring an external meeting room. A business centre provides a far more professional environment than a coffee shop or hotel lobby for an SME hosting a client meeting, and is often a more cost effective option with a larger number of attendees.

Most business centres will hire meeting rooms by the hour, half day or full day on a per room basis, with prices starting from around £19 an hour in central London for a 4 person room, much cheaper than a round of coffee and bagels for 4. The choice of meeting room layouts and locations available is endless; this ensures that you can meet your client somewhere that is convenient for both them and you.

How Flexible Is The Meeting Space?

Meeting rooms can be used for a vast array of different purposes, and perhaps slightly more inventive, purposes. Last year serviced office provider Avanta hired out a number of meeting rooms for non conventional purposes, including a TV commercial, several product launches, fashion showrooms for London Fashion Week and a Bollywood movie. Some meeting room providers can even offer a more glamorous option such as bar or restaurant, a superb venue for a presentation, product launch, or evening drinks event.

The flexibility provided by an external meeting room space, and the benefit of having a dedicated business centre team, mean that almost any request can be serviced by your meeting room provider.

So whilst external meeting rooms are still being used the majority of the time for more conventional business purposes, there is no end to the options available, and with the flexibility of many business centres and meeting rooms you can always find the perfect venue and location, no matter the request.