MakerSpace NYC: Running NYC's Largest Makerspace on Cobot
MakerSpace NYC is New York City's largest community makerspace, running 50,000 sq ft (4,600 sq m) of industrial workspace across two boroughs on Cobot - managing everything from tiered equipment access and safety checkouts to class registrations, day passes, and storage rentals.
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Favorite Cobot Features
The Story Behind MakerSpace NYC
MakerSpace NYC is a non-profit makerspace with two locations in New York City, built on the idea that access to industrial tools and fabrication skills should be open to anyone.
Founders Scott Van Campen and DB Lampman started the space in 2013, after Hurricane Sandy flooded their private studio and metal shop in Staten Island. Rather than rebuild for themselves, they opened the space up to the community. With funding from the New York City Economic Development Corporation and volunteer support, Staten Island MakerSpace opened on October 28, 2013.
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A second partnership with the New York City Economic Development Corporation brought a Brooklyn location to the Brooklyn Army Terminal in Sunset Park in 2019, along with the rebrand to MakerSpace NYC.
That Brooklyn site, Futureworks Makerspace, is now the flagship. It's a 20,000-square-foot industrial prototyping facility with a full fabrication floor: metalworking, woodworking, CNC machining, ceramics, textiles, electronics, and 3D printing, plus laser cutters and waterjet cutters. The Staten Island location adds large-scale fabrication space with overhead cranes and an outdoor area that hosts an annual artist residency.
The Challenge: Keeping a Complex Makerspace Running Smoothly
Running a makerspace at this scale is an operational challenge that most coworking software isn't built to handle.
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Equipment access is not open-door. Every member needs to be certified before using industrial machines, either through a qualifying class or a proficiency test with a staff technician. Tracking who is cleared on what, across dozens of machines and a growing membership, is a constant overhead without the right system.
Billing is complex by nature. Six membership tiers, day passes, laser cutter time, ceramics charges, storage, and fabrication services all need to land on one invoice. As a non-profit with grant reporting obligations, keeping income streams separated is a genuine organizational requirement.
The space is also busy with people who aren't members yet. Drop-in visitors, class attendees, and prospects touring the shop all pass through, and many of them become members later. Tracking that traffic on paper, then re-entering everything when someone signs up, means double work and lost details.
Group programs add a final layer. Schools, workforce development cohorts, and Community Give-Back participants all need access without individual accounts for each participant, and without manually tracking 50 three-month memberships that renew on a rolling cycle.
"Cobot helps us keep all of our membership information in one place without the need for separate spreadsheets or other software. It's very helpful to see a member's profile with all the pertinent information in one place. We can track members and non-members in our system, so we can easily transfer someone over to membership when they decide to join."
How MakerSpace NYC Uses Cobot to Run a Complex Makerspace Operation
Cobot gives MakerSpace NYC one makerspace management software system for certifications, billing, and group access, which matters when the alternative is three separate tools or a spreadsheet held together with goodwill.
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Equipment certifications are tracked directly in each member's profile through Visitor and Member Management, including which machines they are cleared on, when the checkout happened, and which technician signed off. Staff verifies a member's status at a glance instead of cross-referencing paper logs. New members get an automatic welcome email on signup covering the checkout process, the mandatory table saw class, and space rules before they arrive.
The same system tracks non-members. Drop-in visitors and class attendees live in Cobot alongside members, so when someone decides to join, their record converts to a membership without re-entering anything. The casual visitor and the paying member sit in one place, which makes the path from first visit to signup easy to see and easy to act on.
The ceramics studio runs on scheduled access. Members can only use it during specific weekly time blocks, not on demand. Bookings and Calendar manage those slots and give staff a clear view of what's occupied across the shop floor at any time.
Automated Invoicing and Payments consolidates all per-use billing into one invoice: laser cutter time, glaze firing, clay purchases, and fabrication service fees sit alongside the member's monthly plan. Storage rentals run as membership add-ons. For a non-profit with grant reporting obligations, income streams are separated in a way that maps directly to reporting requirements.
Group programs, from school cohorts to the 50 annual Community Give-Back memberships, run through Cobot's Teams feature. One organization pays, participants get access, and rolling three-month cycles expire automatically without manual tracking.
Results with Cobot:
- Equipment certifications tracked per member, removing manual checkout logs
- Members and non-members managed in one system, so visitors convert to memberships without re-entry
- All revenue streams consolidated into one billing system
- Community Give-Back and school cohort access managed without a separate tool
Advice for Other Spaces Considering Cobot
"Cobot is really the only software that we have found that is fully customizable, and the Cobot staff are very helpful and responsive."
