The Conductor will host a grand opening for its new home, the Arnold Innovation Center in downtown Conway, from 5-7 p.m. Sept. 28.
The entrepreneurial support organization will host events and programming at the center as well as rent coworking space, desks and access to meeting rooms. It has already attracted dozens of members, according to Executive Director Grace Rains.
She said The Conductor hopes to have netted 50 members by this fall, and the center’s capacity is around 100.
Annual memberships are offered at a slight discount, but monthly memberships are $25 for coworkers, $100 for meeting space access and $250 for desks.
The center is marketing itself to small businesses and entrepreneurs exclusively. “Our purpose and our mission in this building is to lower barriers for entrepreneurs,” Rains said.
Conway Corp. owns the new building and is leasing it to The Conductor for a nominal annual fee, she said. The utility is also helping cover some operating expenses.
Rains added that other plans for the new space include hosting a monthly coworking lunch to create that “coworking collaborative culture that we want, where people aren't just working here. They like each other and are talking to each other and are hopefully helping each other.”
She said The Conductor is also building a subject matter expert network so that it can have professionals come in to consult startups on certain days of the month.
“So that's another thing we're hoping to bring to this space … an entrepreneurial culture and that ecosystem building, resources within the space so that we're helping them grow. Access to our team and all those things,” Rains said.
