Hybrid work patterns reveal occupancy varies throughout the week with Tuesdays typically being the highest day of the week and Fridays being the lowest. The chart below tracks Tuesday occupancy over time in ten cities and provides a new dimension to the weekly Barometer report. The Peak Day Hybrid Index will now be published weekly, offering a wider aperture into the full picture of workplace occupancy.
Get Weekly UpdatesYou can now track the Return to Work Barometer on the Bloomberg Terminal, available under {ALLX KASL<GO>}
Office Occupancy Falls Around Labor Day Holiday Weekend
The highest day of office occupancy last week was Wednesday at 63.2%. On Tuesday, the usual peak day, average occupancy in the 10 tracked cities was 59.7%, as workers took additional time away from the office to extend the Labor Day holiday weekend. New York City had the largest increase on Wednesday, where occupancy was up nearly 16 points from the previous week to 67.5%. The average low was on Friday at 30.8%, down three and a half points from last week.
Weekly average occupancy fell nine tenths of a point from the previous week to 51.4%, according to the 10-city Back to Work Barometer. Eight of the tracked cities experienced a decrease in occupancy, led by Austin, which dropped nearly four full points from its record highs of the prior two weeks to 66.2%. In New York City, however, average occupancy increased more than three full points to 47.3%.
Last week, Class A+ peak day occupancy rose 7.6 points to 86% on Tuesday. Weekly average occupancy among the Barometer’s Class A+ buildings was 68.5%, up three full points from the previous week. We will continue to provide insights from this subset of over 100 buildings within the Barometer dataset, which have been categorized as Class A+.
Methodology
To provide some clarity on the issues facing American businesses, Kastle has been studying keycard, fob and KastlePresence app access data from the 2,600 buildings and 41,000 businesses we secure across 47 states. We’re analyzing the anonymized data to identify trends in how Americans are returning to the office.
We have tracked and published U.S. office occupancy status in Kastle-secured commercial properties since the beginning of the Covid crisis in early 2020. We continue to seek to help companies navigate the ever-changing workplace landscape and adjust to the ‘new normal’ of office occupancy. Whether full-time hybrid or in-person, our commitment remains to helping American businesses understand how average workplaces are being attended weekly, monthly, and annually.
Kastle’s reach of buildings, businesses and cardholders secured generates millions of access events daily as users enter office complexes, and individual company workspaces. The Barometer weekly report summarizes access control data among our business partners in ten major metro areas, not a national statistical sample. Charted percentages reflect unique authorized user entries in each market relative to a pre-COVID baseline, averaged weekly.*
*On March 22, 2021, Kastle moved from daily to weekly data reporting to provide a more robust and comprehensive picture of office occupancy. We have also recalculated data back to the start of the time series for consistency. This has only a marginal impact on most cities and the national average.
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