BY MARIE BOWER
The CBI has moved its London HQ into a new 25,000 square feet space on the 4th Floor of Cannon Place, as part of a transition aimed at embracing ‘open plan’ working principles. The CBI has over 240,000 members and is the UK’s premier business lobbying organisation. Its main objective is to help create and sustain conditions in which UK businesses can compete and prosper. Its previous home in Centre Point, where the CBI was based for more than 30 years, was a very different environment, with a multi-floor layout.
Speaking about the new space, Elaine McFarlane, Director, HR at the CBI told PV: “We wanted to create an office environment which had impact and was a place our staff and our members could be proud of. The staff are excited about the new building. One sent a lovely note saying how proud they felt to bring members to the new London office, but more importantly that they now felt much more at home and part of the ‘One CBI’ culture we are creating.”
The new space in Cannon Place has been designed to not only improve communication flow through increased collaborative working and informal social interaction, but to also foster creativity and to create a vibrant yet relaxed and agile look and feel. The space incorporates a new café hub and a lounge where members are invited to view the premises as ‘their office’; a place where they can catch up with work, simply charge their mobile phone or enjoy a freshly brewed coffee from the newly installed TopBrewer coffee machine.
The TopBrewer is the ideal solution for the members’ lounge as it is the world’s first premium self service bean-to-cup coffee machine, where users can individually customise their drinks using the TopBrewer app. The minimal swan neck tap design and silent brewer, which uniquely resides under the counter, means that it compliments the modern open plan workspace in a subtle way. Commenting on the TopBrewer, Nigel Hopkins, Resources Director at the CBI said: “It is a technologically advanced solution which members love for its functionality and clean lines, as well as making great drinks.”
‘TopBrewer works perfectly in the members lounge as it is the ideal solution for a hands-off approach to premium coffee.’ Simon Bracken
Simon Bracken, Managing Director of Scanomat UK, said of the new space at Cannon Place; “The CBI has created a great workspace and it definitely evokes a sense of creativity. The TopBrewer works perfectly in the members lounge as it is the ideal solution for a hands-off approach to premium coffee that is versatile enough to cater for the needs of everybody’s individual tastes and preferences. It is self cleaning for a start, meaning that the pipes are flushed between each drink to ensure optimum drink quality. The TopBrewer app is extremely intuitive and easy to use, plus the machine goes from standby to ready in just 45 seconds. We are delighted with the feedback the TopBrewer has received on site and wish the CBI and its members many happy years to come in their new home.”
If you haven’t seen TopBrewer in action, check out this video on Scanomat’s web site.
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