Everyone wants to work in a fancy building these days. WeWork got the memo

One of the core theories of the office market circa 2025 is the flight to quality. Workers, either hybrid staff who spend ample time at home or those prodded back into traditional five-day workweeks, have grown used to the comforts of home and bored with drab, standard office spaces. They need something spectacular to justify a commute or keep them happy, so companies increasingly seek out top-flight offices—Class A or Trophy assets, as a broker would say—which has pushed landlords and developers to spend millions on office renovations and solely focus on building new, top-of-the-line workspaces. 

That same dynamic, where the top-of-the-market bustles with activity while less desirable, Class B spaces sit largely vacant, has also been reshaping how coworking company WeWork manages and thinks about its portfolio of offices.

In March, the company announced that it was increasing the cost of its All Access product in three cities, San Francisco, New York, and London; the $299 basic version of the service, a pandemic-era creation that allows for desk access across the company’s network of spaces, has been eliminated, leaving users to upgrade to the $339 Plus version.

A significant driver of the change, according to Luke Robinson, the company’s regional president for North America, is that the same dynamic has hit the coworking world. In these three cities, the company plans to invest $90 million in refurbishing its top-performing locations with newer finishes and amenities because a sizable portion of the desk demand has migrated to these top-tier locations. 

“You can go get cheap space, but you’re likely in a less desirable building that’s likely dead, that doesn’t have energy,” Robinson says. “At the end of the day, people that are coming to the office aren’t just coming to sit at a desk. They want the experience that goes along with that, right, somewhat of a vibe.” 

This does sound a bit like the original WeWork marketing message; it’s just missing the free beer. But it’s a reality that can be found across urban office markets. Data from office analytics firm CompStak has shown that across the big U.S office markets, rents for Class B (functional space in a good location) and C office (typically older and basic) space barely budged from 2019 to today, rising from $42.45 to $43.50 a square foot. Even rents for regular Class A space, full-service offices in sought-after locations, saw a slight bump during the same time period, from $45.90 to $54.68 a square foot. 

The story is much different for Prime Class A space, or trophy space, which started at $60.85 in 2019 and, beginning at the end of 2021, began to skyrocket, hitting $91.41 by the end of last year.  

WeWork’s shifting space utilization mirrors that demand, with newer stock in preferred locations garnering more attention and booking. In New York City, locations at 134 N. 4th Street in Williamsburg, 33 Irving Plaza, and 154 W. 14th Street near Union Square are the company’s busiest in New York City. Bookings are up 11% year-over-year, and the locations typically fill up by the time the doors open in the morning (citywide, occupancy is above 80% overall).

In San Francisco, locations at 650 California Street, 44 Montgomery Street, and the Salesforce Tower—with a 7% jump in bookings in March—have been packed. The company’s space at 201 Spear, which opened in August, also tends to fill up, with roughly half the members of that space belonging to a group of AI startups.

And in London, 123 Buckingham Palace Road, 30 Churchill Place, and 10 York Road—which has seen bookings skyrocket 29% this March compared to last year—have been slammed. 

The massive shock of instability and uncertainty that has hit the economy in the past few months has pushed more workers, entrepreneurs, and even companies to embrace more coworking, says Robinson. WeWork’s internal survey of clients found that 72% of companies plan to expand their workforce in the next two years, with the majority choosing coworking and flex. A recent report  from brokerage Cushman & Wakefield also found the coworking inventory in the U.S increased by 13% year-over-year, with strong growth in markets like Nashville and Indianapolis. And the $400 million acquisition of competitor Industrious by real estate firm CBRE earlier this year shows continued confidence in flexibility. 

“If companies are going to act fast, it’ll probably be with us, because you can’t make that big of a mistake,” says Robsinon. “Sign a 10-year deal too early, then you’ve got a problem.”

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