A Pacific Beach resident has started a self-employed meet-up group gathering monthly at Turquoise Cafe to network and share experiences.
The self-employed get-togethers are the brainchild of Rob Gordon, who recently began to seek out fellow independent, self-employed individuals via the social media site Next Door.
“Lots of us work independently, so it is nice to get together with others in the same boat to talk about how awesome we are, or to cry in our coffee about not getting enough business,” said Gordon recently on the social media website. “These meetings will be mostly informal, random chats to meet the neighbors. But we will also talk about what we want to do in the future. I would like it to evolve into a ‘co-working session,’ so bring your laptop.
“I’ve been self-employed a long time, since the end of the dot com era,” said Gordon, who was once a program manager in Silicon Valley.
Of his experience being self-employed, Gordon noted, “It’s been feast – and famine.” Gordon’s original idea was to help with all that by creating “a professional services cooperative for self-employed people where we could leverage the skills of each of them.”
Gordon currently has a list of about 25 people interested in participating in the monthly self-employed meet-up.
The meet-up group gathered recently for the second time on Nov. 10 at Turquoise Cafe.
The independent group drew a handful of other PB residents looking to collaborate and share their experiences. One of them was Stephanie Antin, formerly a corporate employee for a TV station, who left to spend more time with her family, who opened a brick-and-mortar business until last year when she became self-employed.
“I had an indoor play center for kids that was doing well until the recession hit and it just got too expensive,” Antin said. “I’m now doing social media consulting and travel blogging from home.”
Dan Derr, a salesman for a small, start-up company commercializing a soap-based product, said he “works from home doing corporate development trying to find customers,” as well as traveling a lot for work.
When asked his expectations of the meet-up group, Derr replied, “I don’t really care what we talk about. It’s nice to have a meeting outside of the house. You’re always going to meet interesting people – make interesting connections.”
Another new meet-up member, Patricia Benesh, is a writing coach with two active websites.
“I have a passion for helping people write their memoirs, and right now I’m focusing on partnering,” Benesh said. “Essentially, I’m a scribe hoping to evoke memories.”
Benesh added the personal testimonials she’s working on, like one with a 97-year-old friend, are “not meant to be published,” but rather are “simply for the family.”
Irene Radley, who turned out for the meet-up with her baby, owns a brick-and-mortar wellness center in PB named Breakthrough Healing Arts. She does a number of things including massage, yoga and nutrition counseling. She said she was looking for something more – and different – from the self-employed, self-help group.
“I have a really good network of clients,” Radley said. “I like talking to other business people. I want to get ideas about running a businesses and being independent, time management or marketing stuff I can glean from the group.”
Antin said she was not looking for a hard-sell networking group to be a part of.
“My idea is that we’re using this group to network referrals, share ideas, brainstorm about different challenges and things that we have going on,” she said. want to meet?
The self-employed meet-up group will next meet 1:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 8 at Turquoise Cafe, 5026 Cass St.