Staff at property portal website Homes-On-Line have just celebrated
their move to new more spacious offices in Cardiff Bay's prestigious
former Coal Exchange.
The
new offices, located in Mount Stuart Square, are set in the
heart of Cardiff's rapidly expanding hi-tech centre which is
attracting new media, Internet design and other computer based
companies - as well as a host of trendy wine bars, cafes and
restaurants overlooking Cardiff Bay.
But the move is not typical of the rash of dot-com bubble bursting
companies which set up internet web sites, rented hi-tech offices
in prestigious locations, spent a fortune on marketing and advertising
- and then hit the wall. For Homes-On-Line the move has meant
the company acquiring bigger and better office accommodation
in a more prestigious location - at a lower rent than they were
paying before.
Managing Director Guy Baker, a former computer programmer and
consultant with Fujitsu who set up Homes-On-Line in 1996 with
Fujitsu colleague Gerald de la Pascua, said: "The move arose
from a culmination of circumstances which suited everyone. The
owners of our previous premises just around the corner in James
Street needed to expand and we had reached the stage where we
needed more space. Gerald and I had looked at several premises
in Cardiff Bay but none were suitable, and then the refurbished
offices in the former Coal Exchange became available. Fortunately
for us they were just what we were looking for and on the market
at a lower rent than we were currently paying."
The new offices are a far cry from Homes-On-Line's humble beginnings
when Guy and Gerald established the company working from the
garage at Guy's Kent home. Today the company carries details
of more than 100,000 properties being offered by more than 1,000
estate agents throughout the UK and hosts the websites of more
than 300 of its own member agents. It also issues a weekly Internet
newsletter to over 155,000 subscribers and is seeing the subscription
increase by 1,000 a week.
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