Three floors, brought together as one community.
- +500–600%
- personal connections across departments
- 140,807
- cups served in two years
- +18%
- office attendance in JLL’s own survey (2.9 to 3.4 days)
- 95%+
- of people report improved wellbeing
JLL occupied three separate floors, and teams rarely crossed paths beyond their own level. Post-pandemic, the workplace had become competitive: people had a choice about where to work, and a great desk was not enough to bring them in. The strategists wanted a space where people chose to come in, chose to connect, and felt proud of where they worked.
- A custom-designed cafe bar aligned to JLL’s workplace aesthetic, with La Marzocco and Mahlkonig equipment.
- Full-time embedded baristas working as community anchors, greeting people by name.
- A fully subsidised menu, so nothing stood between a person and the daily moment of connection.
- A live dashboard of cups, peak times, consumption and sustainability, with automated reporting.
Hear it from JLL.
Post-pandemic, the workplace is really operating in a competitive environment. People have to decide whether or not to come in. A place that simply does a great job of providing excellent workplaces, desks, meeting room technologies isn't enough anymore. People want that social dynamism and magnetism that draws them in and makes them want to be here. Remote working is great for getting work done and doing a lot of focused work, but it's not great for that human connection and building relationships in the organisation. You really need that place where people can come together and connect as a group. As the lead workplace strategist for this project, one of the key elements for us was about bringing our people together. We were across three different floors in the building and we wanted to bring everyone to this unifying workplace to connect people, to collaborate and to grow. The key driver for us, the cafe, was a big part of that because that was really about creating that sense of community. What would entice our people back and what would be the differentiator for our clients? With the cafe culture that you see here in Melbourne, it was just a really no-brainer to really bring it into the heart of the office. First and foremost, it had to be the full barista experience. The coffee had to be top quality. We're competing with all the cafes around here and Melbourne's got some of the best coffee shops going around. When I first met with Ryan, the thing that struck me was his love of coffee. From day one, it has been like working with a best mate. Coffee on cue stood out as someone who was willing to go over and above and understood our workplace vision as well. I think really the baristas and the experience that they brought, they're as much as creating a front of house experience in our offices as the guys on reception. It was a real success just from day one. You're just coming out of the lift and just the wall of noise that you've got and that real buzz in the office. My personal connections with my colleagues, particularly across departments, increased maybe five or six hundred percent. That's allowed me to not only increase how productive I am at work, but increase my circle of friends. If someone has a best friend at work, they're more than twice as likely to recommend their employer as a great place to work. It's a great organic way to connect and collaborate with people. It's not forced whatsoever. It's wonderful to sort of stop, take a breather, go out there and say, oh my goodness, Stephen, you're here today or Joe, you're here today. I don't even think about working from home anymore because I find this place a better place to work, better place to connect with people and just I get more energy out of this place than I would do working from home. It makes me feel proud. People are gobsmacked. I think it's a wonderful space and it does, it makes you feel really proud. People feel really pleased that they work for JLL. Over ninety-five percent of people have said that the working environment improves their sense of well-being. It also creates an incredible environment to host your clients in a space that you create, that they associate with your brand. We see a lot of that collaboration, that bump factor happening in the office where, you know, if you're going out to get your coffees, you know, that's all a very dispersed experience. We're saving about five FTE per year just in the time saved of people leaving the building, going down into the elevator, crossing the road and waiting in line at that cafe across the road where the experience isn't well created. So just on that one metric, the experience more than justifies itself. But that's just one metric. We've been able to avoid just over one metric tonne of waste. Tens of thousands of reusable coffee cups we haven't used because we have this booster experience. So from a sustainability point of view, that's really powerful. One of our senior leaders actually said to me on day one, I feel like I've been given a warm hug by the office. This is a living, breathing example of what we do. I couldn't imagine that we've ever implemented an initiative that's had as much positive feedback from our people than this coffee on cue experience.
A morning at the bar.
What changed for the team.
- JLL reports a 500 to 600% increase in personal connections across departments since the cafe launched.
- In JLL’s own survey, average office days rose from 2.9 to 3.4 a week, an 18% lift with no mandate.
- 140,807 cups served across two years, growing 12.5% year on year.
- An estimated 5 FTE a year saved in time people no longer spend leaving the building for coffee.