SETTING UP SHOP
Networking on Steroids
It’s been a long time since the last blog post, so there’s a lot of catching up to do. We didn’t want to continue the blog on the old website until the new one was finished, and you can see the result here. So what do you think? It’s better this way, right?
Before we get too far ahead of ourselves, I want to look back at the last couple of weeks. Last time I wrote about how we were going to Hong Kong for Rise and how we were going to move to a new office. Well, we went to Rise and it was great. Olaf, Alessandro, Thomas and Chun pitched their way through the floors of the Hong Kong Convention centre while meeting a lot of new and inspiring people and learning the tropes of networking on the highest level. “Like networking on steroids”, were their exact words if I remember correctly. You can read the full report by Thomas on Medium.
Historically Inspiring
We also moved to a new office, but not to Regus as reported in the last post. We’ve found a brand new office in the centre of Leiden, right at the top of the Level Leiden building. When we have time to look up from our laptops, we’re treated on a nice view of the old inner city of Leiden. We’re still busy decorating the place and setting up shop, but it’s a good step forward for us. Our new location is not only practical for business and aesthetically beautiful, but also historically inspiring.
The famous Dutch scientist Herman Boerhaave accomplished most of his work in Leiden and when we look out our window we can see windmill De Put towering above ‘het galgewater’ (the gallow waters). In the shadow of De Put lies the Weddesteeg, a small alley where a painter called Rembrandt van Rijn was born during the Golden Age.
Exciting Times
What’s more, the office is already getting crowded now that more people have decided to quit their job to work full-time on Floown. Yes, these are exciting times and the belief in Floown is starting to grow. In the first week of November we will also be present at the Web Summit in Dublin. Rise gave us our first real taste of networking in the tech world and now we’re hungry for more. You will be hearing more about the Web Summit in the following weeks.
As mentioned in the first few lines, you’re reading this blog post on our new website (or on Medium!). It’s already the third version of our site and hopefully this one will satisfy the bosses a bit longer. No, it’s an interesting process, this building of websites. You keep going back and forth between what we think is cool and what works and what you expect that the customers want to see. I think we’ve now found the right balance between practical information and a lean, economical style that fits our platform. But as always, we have to wait and see. The website is live now and the final product will be soon; so if you have any comments or feedback on the new site, don’t hesitate to contact us.
This blog post was originally posted on our company blog.
