I’m going to go back to the start. Not the start of our business journey, but how and why we began looking for a business property in Spain. This is the origin story of DeskSpace. There are a few threads to pull together:
- My daughter’s love of the idea of selling ice cream
- My role as a business coach and entrepreneur
- Our monthly business book club
For the love of ice cream:
Our daughter, who’s 11, has had an ongoing interest in making and selling ice cream. We were inspired by watching the Netflix series Chef’s Table, particularly by the episode with chef Sarah Minnick, who runs a pizza and homemade ice-cream restaurant in Portland, Oregon, with flavours including fig leaf ice-cream.
Passion for business
I have a deep love for business in all its forms, but my true passion lies in growing small and medium-sized businesses and often working with owners to sell them. When my daughter shows an interest in business, I strive to nurture her business skills. I want to inspire her to understand entrepreneurship, gently imparting the skills and knowledge necessary to start and grow a successful business.
Book Club
I run a monthly business book club. It’s only a small book club that I run over Zoom (although we’re not currently accepting new members). Each month we delve into a book. Mainly they’re business and psychology books. Sometimes the books are classics and sometimes new releases. Duncan Bannatyne from the UK TV show Dragons’ Den had ice-cream vans early in his career. We read his biography, and it became a fascinating book club choice.
The Property:
With the ice-cream parlour scenario front of mind (having recently finished Bannatyne’s biography), my wife saw a property advertised privately on Facebook. She joked about it being in an ideal location to turn it into an ice-cream parlour. I arranged a viewing. The property was too large for business needs, and we weren’t serious about an ice-cream parlour. However, this led us to the idea of renting out desks.
We conducted research on the viability of our idea. There was nothing similar in the area. Does this mean there’s no demand? We asked numerous questions and spoke to many people. The original property fell through. The original name we had for the property fell through.
But we found another property. It needed work. But as they say, location, location, location. That work took time. Of course, we have to “create demand.” This is one of the reasons we have a page called what can I do in Mojacar.
So, that’s the story behind DeskSpace Mojácar.
Jana said: “I’ll be there as soon as it opens – and I’ll be there for a month.”
What did DeskSpace look like?
The inside of the building needed “some work”—some might even call it distressed. Everything in the building was broken.
- Filthy Floors: The floor was absolutely filthy.
- Bathroom/Prep Room: The bathroom and prep room desperately needed attention, with exposed pipework jutting out of the floor and walls.
- Window Stickers: Old stickers cluttered the windows.
- Difficult Screws: Any protruding screws had their heads removed, making them a challenge to extract.