Posted on 02.16.11

Furniture Facelift: New Workstations, Better Productivity

by Steven Zeisler

Interior workspace makeover? Yes please! We just underwent an office overhaul with new furniture from Turnstone, giving our work environment a sleek and professional image upgrade while fostering more productivity and creativity.

“The desks Mightybytes has been using for the past ten years or so have served us very well, but they outlived their usefulness probably about four years ago,” Tim said. “When your desk starts wobbling on its legs every time a computer is moved, it’s definitely time for an upgrade.”

The gang sat down with two Turnstone representatives and went through the website page by page and checked out all the models, went through the ordering process, etc. The Turnstone crew has been very helpful throughout the entire undertaking for replacing old desks with new smart and well-engineered workstations that meet our office’s unique needs.

Workspace Creativity

The new furniture has only been in for a couple weeks and already we are seeing improvements:

• Spacious and solid workstations give us more room to work creatively.
• Large and comfortable conference table improves longer brainstorming sessions and stronger collaboration.
• Turnstone desks can be re-arranged into different configurations to fit the needs of particular spaces.
• More creative and productive work areas make for better results.
• No one’s back hurts!

Here’s a video we produced as part of the whole process:

This video is one of four featured customer stories on the new iPad app Turnstone is building with tools to help people design their own spaces. Get some new office ideas and see the fun new workstations at the Mightybytes Flickr and Facebook pages.

Emily, a representative from Turnstone, made the trek to Chicago to ensure that the furniture was in order and that it was properly setup. She was even nice enough to order a few pizzas and bruschetta from our downstairs neighbors Calo Restaurant, while we were installing the furniture. Talk about customer service!

In total, 60+ boxes of Turnstone office furniture came to the office:

• Delivery was just under 2,000 pounds
• Eight workstations (included built-in power strips) with chairs
• One conference table with chairs
• One bookshelf

Due to ninja-like skills with box cutters, the Turnstone furniture (made from partially recycled materials) were out of their cardboard boxes in no time. Only five hours later, the furniture was completely installed in the office and the first round of beers were cracked at the new conference table.

Our brand new Turnstone conference table.

Productivity: Toward a Greener Office

Of course once it was all over our biggest question was where the heck would all the leftover cardboard go?. The stack of 60+ boxes certainly wasn’t going to fit in the office’s 10 gallon recycle bins.

The cardboard was temporarily stored on the back deck, but doing this during a Chicago winter meant it wouldn’t be long before the boxes were blown all over Andersonville. Our across-the-street neighbors at Eco-Andersonville suggested calling the folks at The Resource Center, who for a small fee (discounted because we are an Eco Andersonville-certified green company) disposed of the mammoth pile in an environmentally-friendly manner.

The Turnstone workstations have optimized the office as a green, smart, and creative environment. Gone are the days of worrying about wobbly desks, now we can focus on producing great work.

Consider checking out Turnstone’s business product line if you need to give your own office a productivity overhaul. Another great resource for optimizing your workplace is Pamela Meyer’s book, From Workplace to Playspace.

Got any other great resources for building out a creative workspace? We are always on the lookout for new options to improve workflow, comfort, and creativity. Let us know!