We had a big milestone event recently – we moved offices. And we didn’t just move to any office space – we moved back to the same space we were in 10 years ago. Back story: In 2016, we moved from Aspen Grove into a big, beautiful space we called Gothic Court. If you know us, you might know that our office culture is something we hold dear. Up until 2020, that meant we all worked together in the same office, and Gothic Court provided a very nice home for us. But it was a big space. Once we migrated to a hybrid work environment, it became much more than we needed, with overhead that was unnecessary. Fun fact – you might think having 3 dishwashers is a luxury, but in reality it’s a logistical nightmare that required their own tiny whiteboards.
Hello (again) Aspen Grove
This fall, we packed up our things and moved back to the old office after giving it a little refresh. For anyone who’s ever downsized during a move, you’ll understand the work required for unloading the extra furniture and ‘treasures’ that accumulate over time – treasures we had a lot of. Thankfully, we have an amazing office manager, Liz, who took on the challenge of not only re-homing the extra things we didn’t need via in office competitions and charity donations, but also making the new office feel like it’s ours.
We recently had our year-end all company gathering, Thanksmas, and for a few of us, it felt like a homecoming. Coming back to our roots has unearthed a ton of great memories for the 10 folks who were around for the first residency at Aspen Grove. I knew we were ‘home’ again when I spied Ben Clark playing Magic: The Gathering with some of our newer team members in the same space where I learned to play it in 2014.
Moving forward
On the surface, it might appear that moving back to the physical place we were in 10 years ago is a step backwards. But that couldn’t be farther from the truth. We’ve doubled the number of people that work at Rustici since 2015 and have grown our customer base by 10x. The difference? Like many companies, we’ve adapted to embrace a hybrid work place, which means there are fewer of us that live near the office and who opt to work from there. In our case, an office downsizing simply means rightsizing to what the shape of our company looks like today. Gothic Court carries a big bank of memories in its own right, but Aspen Grove is our future for all of the right reasons.
Now to get back to the pesky task of unpacking. And if you need to update your records, our new address is: 3351 Aspen Grove Drive Ste 300 Franklin, TN 37067.
