Reportedly, water coolers have develop into a key way for corporations to track office occupancy levels during the ongoing return to office.
Water discharge data from internet-connected models sold by Bevi grew in parallel with office attendance reported by corporations across the country, BloOmberg reported last week, citing data from a Boston-based company.
Some hedge funds and investors have expressed interest in examining the watercooler data to gain insights into office occupancy rates, Bevi CEO Sean Grundy told Bloomberg.
“The quantity of water people drink seems to be indicator of how much time they spend in the office,” Grundy said. “For us, it’s positive that the trend is growing.”
The typical amount of water distributed by Bevi machines in 2021 was 28.1% of its pre-pandemic level in 2019, the facility said. According to data collected by Kastle Systems, office occupancy rates in 10 major US cities reached 30% in the same 12 months.
Water cooler utilization increased to 43.8% in 2022, close to the occupancy rate of 41.6% reported by Kastle. Thus far this 12 months, the average monthly water distributed has exceeded 50.5%, barely higher than the return to office rate of 45.6%.
According to the report, Bevi has supplied water coolers to greater than 5,000 US corporations.
The Post contacted Bevi for further comments.
A growing variety of CEOs are pushing for more conversations around the office water cooler while forcing employees to spend more time on site.
Amazon and Disney are amongst the corporations which have increased office attendance requirements recently.
Disney CEO Bob Iger cited the “enormous value of being along with the people you’re employed with”, while ordering corporate employees to return at the least 4 days per week starting this month.
Some employees have abandoned efforts to track attendance through badge swiping or other enforcement methods.
At Amazon, employees recently called on CEO Andy Jassy to “immediately cancel” his plan to return to the office.
According to a report by the Wall Street Journal, across the US, office occupancy rates oscillate between 40% and 60% of pre-pandemic levels – well below the variety of office returns in Europe and Asia.