Change Please To Open First Manchester Location At Landmark

Barings And Hana Announce Homelessness Social Enterprise As Coffee Bar Operator

1^st February 2021 – Barings Real Estate, one of the world’s largest diversified real estate investment managers, in partnership with Flexible workspace group Hana, have signed award-winning premium coffee company and social enterprise supporting people out of homelessness, Change Please, to operate the coffee and pastry bar within its Landmark, Manchester office development in St Peter’s Square.

Barings recently announced it has signed a management agreement with Hana to design, build and operate the 32,000 sq ft of flexible space at Landmark. Hana at St Peter’s Square is scheduled to open in mid-2021. Continuing a long-standing and supportive relationship with Change Please, Barings has let the ground floor for the social enterprise to operate the coffee and pastry bar within Hana’s space. Change Please is now due to open at Landmark this summer.

The location will be the first outside of London for Change Please, which provides training and employment as baristas along with support with housing, finances and therapy to help people experiencing homelessness to move forward. The organisation was launched in 2015 with one coffee cart in Covent Garden and since then has gone from strength to strength and partners with many global businesses. It has launched its first site in Perth, Australia with others around the globe including Paris and Dublin due to follow. 100% of the profits of the award-winning premium coffee goes towards ending homelessness. Change Please in Landmark will act as a key hub with a dedicated training space, to allow individuals to exit homelessness and back into society and recruitment will focus on Change Please’s local and national partnerships with Shelter, Crisis, St Mungo’s, and local smaller hostels.

The award winning 180,000 sq ft Landmark development was completed in 2020 and offers 14 floors of BREEAM Excellent and Wired Score Platinum certified highly efficient office space in the prime core of Manchester City Centre. Barings’ focus on well-being, customer experience, sustainability and technological infrastructure at Landmark has delivered a world-class office building and provides all-important facilities for existing and future tenants, including the introduction of contactless technologies enabling touch-free movement within the building, a dedicated cycle storage and maintenance hub, high quality showers and changing facilities, electric car charging spaces and Amazon lockers for a convenient package delivery and returns service.

Ian Mayhew, Managing Director at Barings, said; “We are delighted to be able to welcome Change Please to Landmark and continue our support towards this fabulous enterprise. The work that Change Please does is incredible and closely aligns with Barings’ overall social impact strategy.  They are making a real difference in people’s lives, providing individuals with a living wage and a sustainable career opportunity. It’s also great to be announcing another transaction at Landmark that will provide an important amenity for all occupiers in the building. We are looking forward to seeing the new coffee bar facility take shape in Landmark over the forthcoming months.”

Paul Nellist, EMEA Managing Director, Hana said; “‘We’re delighted to partner with Change Please, an award-winning coffee company making a social impact — helping people move out of homelessness by training them to become a barista. Having Change Please operate the ground floor coffee bar at Hana at St Peter’s Square means the profit from every amazing cup of coffee we deliver is used to provide a living wage and a career for someone in need. This relationship is a win-win – it aligns with Hana’s values and commitment to empowering social enterprises, whilst providing a true amenity to the building.”

Cemal Ezel, CEO of Change Please, said; “Opening our first location outside of London is an opportunity that fills us with huge excitement. We have been targeting Manchester for a number of years, and partnering with Barings and Hana to launch our first regional training hub will position Change Please in the city, and allows us to focus on ensuring individuals have a pathway to exit homelessness, and re-enter society – all through serving a very good cup of coffee. Landmark is an iconic and central location which gives us good visibility to the many large organisations located in the vicinity.”

Leasing agents on Landmark are CBRE and Colliers International.