2025 Guide - Financial Perspective on Workspace Costs

A while back, I started hearing the same complaint over and over again from our team: "We can’t find any available meeting rooms." At first, I didn’t get it. We had plenty of rooms! But when I’d walk around the office, I’d see empty spaces left and right. What was going on here?

It turns out, I wasn’t the only one facing this issue. I’m Luka Birsa, co-founder of Joan Workplace and this frustration is exactly what led us to create the solution we offer today. Back then, our team either didn’t bother reserving rooms or ignored our outdated pen-and-paper system. The result? Chaos. Renovating or renting more office space wasn’t an option, so I said to myself: "No way. Not in my house." 

That’s when we set out to solve the problem, once and for all.

Follow along to see how we turned this mess into solutions that actually work. But first, let’s talk about the hidden costs of poor meeting room management—and how you can reclaim them without causing a stir.

P.S. Before I move on, let me tell you that we decided to host a webinar on how to audit your meeting rooms and optimize your space for 2025. + Bonus at the end of the webinar, free 1-on-1 audit!

The not-so-hidden workplace crisis

It’s a familiar scene in offices across the globe:

• Meeting rooms marked as "booked" but standing completely empty.
• Teams wandering around, hunting for available rooms like it's a scavenger hunt.
• And that awkward moment when two teams show up at the same time, booking conflicts in full display.

It’s not just an inconvenience – it’s a real productivity killer. In a typical office, meeting rooms remain unused 45% of the time while still appearing "booked" in calendars. That's like paying for a car you never drive. Your CFO will definitely not find this funny when it’s time for a budget review.

The real price tag of chaos 

Now, let’s talk about the numbers. The costs associated with workspace inefficiencies are more shocking than your daily coffee bill. Here's a quick breakdown:

• Direct space costs: Every meeting room represents a chunk of your real estate expenses—rent, maintenance, and utilities. If rooms aren’t being used efficiently, you’re essentially paying for empty space.
• Utility waste: Lights left on, AC running, screens glowing—all in rooms that no one is actually using. It’s like keeping a car running while it’s parked in your driveway.
• Productivity drain: Employees waste valuable time each day searching for available meeting rooms or dealing with scheduling conflicts. This time could be better spent on actual work, but it’s slipping through the cracks.

Now, let’s do the math. In a company with 100 employees, if each person wastes just 15 minutes per day hunting for meeting spaces or resolving booking conflicts, that’s 1,500 minutes wasted per day—or 300,000 minutes (or $300,000) in lost productivity annually, assuming an average salary of $50/hour.

Is your office leaking time and money? 

It starts small—a complaint here, a frustrated comment there:
"Why are all the rooms booked, but no one’s inside?"
"Why is this team in our reserved space?"
"Why does it take so long to find a meeting room?"

Sound familiar? These aren’t just annoyances—they’re symptoms of a larger problem. Inefficient meeting room management doesn’t just drain time; it drains money.

Here’s a quick meeting room audit to see where your office stands:

1. The Empty Room Mystery: Do employees constantly complain about unavailable rooms that appear empty?
2. Double-Booking Disasters: Are two teams showing up for the same room at the same time?
3. Room Hogging Habits: Are large conference rooms often occupied by small groups of 2–3 people?
4. The Ghost Meeting Phenomenon: Are meeting rooms reserved on the calendar but left unused?
5. Time-Wasting Hunts: Are employees spending 10+ minutes a day searching for available rooms?
6. Utility Overload: Are lights, AC, or equipment frequently left on in empty spaces?

If you checked off two or more of these issues, it’s time to optimize. These inefficiencies aren’t just annoying—they cost real money and drain productivity. The good news? Solving them can be simpler than you think, and the benefits ripple across your entire organization.

Here’s a better visualization of how to start auditing your meeting rooms: 

Speaking of auditing your meeting rooms… We're hosting a special webinar to help you audit and optimize your workplace. This session will guide you through practical steps to streamline meeting room bookings, enhance space utilization, and bring order to your workplace.

Sign up for the webinar here.

Pain points beyond costs

Okay, let’s be real: meeting room chaos isn’t just about burning through cash—it’s also messing with your vibe. 🙄 When people spend their days scrambling to find a room or get stuck in booking issues, it’s not just frustrating—it totally kills the flow. And let’s face it, a distracted team? Not exactly the dream team.

You’re also losing something even more precious than time—morale. People want to feel like their time matters. When rooms are constantly double-booked or left empty with lights still on, it feels like their work isn’t being respected. And we all know what happens when morale dips, right? That spark of creativity? Gone.

But here’s the thing: it’s not just about the money spent on wasted space and underutilized rooms. It's the energy that's drained, the connections that aren't made because the space wasn’t ready, and the productivity that gets lost in all the chaos.

If this sounds like a nightmare you’re stuck in—don’t worry, there’s hope. Fixing this can actually be pretty straightforward, and trust me, the benefits go way beyond the bottom line. It’s about setting your team up to focus, collaborate, and actually enjoy their work environment. So, let’s stop the madness and get it together, yeah?

Your quick-wins for 2025 🎯

Ready to make a dent in those costs? Here’s a streamlined action plan for cutting your meeting room chaos—and it doesn’t require a complete office overhaul:

• Smart time blocks: Switch to default meeting lengths of 25 or 50 minutes instead of the traditional 30/60-minute blocks. These small time buffers can help prevent the cascade of meetings spilling over into each other.
• Auto-release protocol: Implement a 10-minute no-show policy. If no one shows up for the meeting, the room automatically becomes available for others.
• Smart space matching: Avoid the inefficiency of small teams booking large rooms. Setting guidelines to prevent this can free up space for teams that actually need it.
• Peak-hour rules: During high-demand periods, consider implementing stricter booking policies to ensure everyone has a fair chance to book a space.
• Attendance tracking: Monitor who frequently misses meetings or cancels without notifying. A little nudge can often solve a lot of wasted time.
• Clear consequences: Set clear consequences for repeated no-shows. A simple reminder to employees can encourage better booking habits.

Imagine the possibilities

What if your meeting rooms could handle all of this automatically while you focus on more important tasks? Imagine the time you’d save by eliminating these administrative headaches.

How EPIC rescued lost creative hours

Take EPIC Agency, for example. They moved to a bigger office, but quickly found themselves caught in the meeting room mess—double bookings, last-minute room grabs, and scheduling issues that disrupted their creative flow. 

 “People were not used to checking which room they actually booked. So they would go to a meeting room thinking, oh I would actually prefer to go into this room because there is more natural light, or I love the decoration, or because it was bigger or smaller or whatever,” said Olivier, the dedicated Happiness Manager at Epic Agency. 

Their solution? A meeting room management system that optimized space usage, reducing unnecessary interruptions.

• Meeting interruptions dropped 92% (from 8 disruptions per day to less than 1)
• Average time spent finding a room? Down from 12 minutes to just 48 seconds
• Double bookings decreased from 27 incidents/week to zero in the first month
• Space utilization jumped from 52% to 82% - that's 30% more value from the same square footage

For a creative agency billing at premium rates, those saved minutes add up fast. Consider this: When each team member saves 15 minutes daily (no more room-hunting safaris), that's 60 hours of premium billable time back per person, per year. For EPIC, that meant turning wasted minutes into billable magic. Now, you get to have the chance to audit your meeting rooms and fix mismanagement with our help.