RALEIGH – One stirring example of Raleigh’s flourishing startup ecosystem is the growing number of incubators and coworking spaces exclusively promoting growth for startups and small businesses. Our “State of Startups” package offers a glance at a sampling of spaces that have opened or expanded in the last year.

Industrious

This year, the local arm of national coworking chain Industrious expanded into a separate additional floor of its downtown Charter Square building on Fayetteville Street. This added approximately 12,000 square feet for new tenants.

The space is known for its chic, yet cozy appeal with private offices and coworking for individuals and teams. Industrious also has a cafe offering Counter Culture coffee, local beer, pastries and fruit.

Nest Raleigh

The Nest Raleigh coworking space opened in the summer of 2016 to give startups, entrepreneurs and freelancers/remote workers a place to work in the heart of downtown Raleigh on Fayetteville Street.

Earlier this year, the multi-floor space expanded by an additional 4,000 square feet to accommodate more tenants.

Inside Nest Raleigh

Nest Raleigh offers tenants communal work areas, a conference room, event space, desks and suites, phone booths, a kitchen, as well as perks like free Wi-Fi and Google Fiber service, parking, coffee and beer.

Community events are also hosted at Nest Raleigh. The most recent events include a workshop on how to build apps, led by the team at local startup Dropsource, as well as a series of monthly meetups for makers, designers and creatives called Kvetch & Collaborate.

The Pinkubator

In February, serial entrepreneur turned investor Cindy Whitehead opened an incubator for female-led startups or startups with products/services that are relevant to women.

Companies apply to the space and, if accepted, the Pinkubator extends resources and business development services to them from Whitehead and mentors.

Shaw University Innovation & Entrepreneurship Center

This year, the Carolina Small Business Development Fund teamed up with Raleigh’s Shaw University to open a space to extend programming and support to minority-owned startups and small businesses in and around the university’s campus.

Inside Shaw University center

The Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center offers students, staff and community members the resources and tools they need to get their ventures off the ground and to launch. In addition to providing direct access to the Carolina Small Business Development Fund, the center also offers workshops, business development panels, funding resources and venture capital connections.

The center is host to LaunchRALEIGH, a new program that provides Southeast Raleigh entrepreneurs eight hours of business development training, up to $2,500 in micro-loans, assigned mentors and networking with fellow local business owners. LaunchRALEIGH was announced earlier this year, coinciding with the opening of the Innovation & Entrepreneurship Center. It’s the result of a partnership between Shaw University, the North Raleigh Rotary Club and the Wake Tech Center for Entrepreneurship.

Loading Dock Raleigh

This year, local coworking space Loading Dock Raleigh raised $836,000 to expand its coworking space for startup companies and nonprofits. It also exceeded 100 members in April.

The expansion was originally conceived of when Loading Dock leadership noticed a demand for more space among members.

The expanded space consists of brand new office suites and conference rooms, as well as an area for ecommerce and consumer products startups to store equipment and items. Loading Dock is already taking reservations for early tenants at the new space.