Axa launches Stories, an innovative ‘urban village’ and promotes the occupant experience

The background

Stories is a unique campus designed for companies looking to bring together their employees from the Île-de-France region. Stories is an urban village in a metropolitan setting, close to the Boulevard Périphérique. It's a protected Urban Village organized around a central garden with Grand Rue, Grand Jardin, Galerie des Cultures, and numerous communal facilities and amenities. This 65,000 m² campus consists of two buildings and includes 9,000 m² of distinct service areas. The entire complex boasts multiple certifications including HQE Certification (exceptional level), BREEAM Certification (excellent level), WELL Certification (Silver), Wired Score, Effinergie +, Open Work approach. Currently, 1,500 employees are experiencing 'the Stories experience'.

AXA IM Alts, transformed the building into 'Stories, the inspiring village—a modern, innovative space'. BNP RE now manages the building and has enlisted Circles the mission of enriching the venue's service offering. BNP's objectives include increasing the building's occupancy rate, tenant retention, implementing innovative technological solutions while ensuring excellent quality of work life for occupants.

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Circles’ Solution

To achieve our client’s goal is of enhancing venue attractiveness and tenant retention, Circles has implemented a unique and personalized experience conducive to networking, collaboration, and creativity. Our team of five, soon to be seven, plays key roles in orchestrating this experience. Here's the role of each person within this team:

• The Experience Manager, also known as the Hospitality Manager, is the ambassador of the STORIES experience. They act as a point of reference for tenants, especially for their event programming, and ensure coordination with other site providers. For example, when 1,000 employees from one tenant company arrived in waves, the Experience Manager assisted in organizing a vibrant welcome experience with a DJ, candy bars, cotton candy stands, venue tours, and free services to welcome their employees. Additionally, when faced with a last minute change, Circles organized, a seminar with catering and conference programming in the auditorium and throughout the campus for 200 people from the global top management of one of the tenants. The Experience Manager skillfully searched for external providers, coordinated site partners like Sodexo for catering, negotiated prices, and handled operational event organization. These efforts greatly facilitate the lives of tenant companies and contribute to their satisfaction and retention at STORIES.

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• Our Hospitality team, consisting of two members, plays a crucial role in welcoming visitors to the main hall at STORIES. They oversee various tasks, including managing the cloakroom, handling package deliveries, and facilitating bookings for the auditorium, business center, Galerie des Cultures, and other common areas. As new tenants are expected to join the site in the future, the team will be expanded with two additional members. Additionally, a second hall will be opened to accommodate the growing tenant community.

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• The Community Manager is responsible for curating the events program at STORIES and managing site communication. This includes both print and digital media, with a particular focus on their digital app and on-site digital screens. Collaborating with BNP’s community, the Community Manager organizes thematic animations that have been highly successful. These events, which offer unique experiences to tenants, attract between 300 and 400 participants each month. Examples of popular events include Epiphany king cake celebrations, pop-up stores offering Valentine's Day gift ideas and rose offerings, Easter egg hunts, live broadcasts of sporting events like Roland Garros and the Tour de France, quizzes for St. Patrick's Day, horror film screenings and pumpkin carving workshops for Halloween, a Christmas market, ugly sweater contests, and a memorable gospel choir performance for the year-end festivities.

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• The Concierge plays a vital role in managing the service providers operating within STORIES. They oversee the connected locker service, which includes dry cleaning, shoe repair, and alterations. The Concierge also manages the on-site mini-grocery store/café space and is responsible for organizing and supervising the Well-being & Hairstyling space, ensuring the well-being of all site occupants.

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Outcomes

More than 700 services have been used in the past 6 months. The events program has gathered more than 3000 participations.  The user satisfaction rate expressed in the first year of activity is 96.01%. It attests to the quality of services, interactions with our team, and the speed of request processing. A new tenant is moving in this spring.

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Together, BNP and Circles have created an environment conducive to productivity, innovation, and well-being on a campus that prioritizes the occupant experience to make it memorable.

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