There are many reasons to consider relocating your offices, retail store, or server facility to a new location. Maybe you can get a better deal on rent and utilities. Perhaps you’re ready to expand, and you need more room to grow the business.
Whatever the reason behind this decision, know that commercial moves are very common.
However, they’re also among the most complicated types of moves, especially from a logistics standpoint. One can argue that moving with all your belongings overseas, including your personal vehicle, is often easier.
With that said, it’s vital to understand the process and intricacies of commercial moving in NYC. Once the process is clear, you’ll realize why this isn’t the type of project you want to manage on-the-fly with a DIY relocation.
Commercial Moving NYC vs. Residential Moving
Moving items from point A to B may seem like a straightforward process. But depending on what you’re moving to, it can be quite different.
Moving companies for businesses have more work to do than your average home furniture movers.
Although complicated at times, a household moving job can often be managed with minimal labor. The costs aren’t too high, and you can often afford to move at your desired pace. There’s no need to rush with packing, unpacking, installing appliances, etc.
The biggest concern people have is finding a moving company that can ensure their belongings are transported safely and arrive on time.
Things are a bit different regarding office moving. NYC commercial relocations can have various requirements. For example, moving a retail store involves a different process than relocating a company’s headquarters to a new office building.
In many cases, you can’t afford to take it slow and unpack your belongings, office furniture, workstations, computers, and other items yourself. The quicker you get set up at the new location, the faster you can resume business operations.
Downtime and not having your offices ready can cause you to lose revenue and prevent you from delivering products and services to customers.
This is why it’s important to hire an office moving company. NYC movers specializing in commercial relocations can help you unpack and install everything in the new building. This minimizes your business’ downtime and prevents loss of productivity.
Another aspect to consider is the different types of cargo handled during an office relocation. NYC business movers know that they must protect, safely deliver, and install more electronic equipment than in a residential move, along with files, complex workstations, etc.
Therefore, the equipment involved, from packing boxes to straps to the vehicles used, can differ greatly, as do the logistics.
Executing a relocation job on a commercial scale will require comprehensive planning and preparation, which is why it’s essential to get help from office movers. NYC street accessibility can be tough, and without a well-outlined strategy, you can experience lots of hiccups when moving commercial goods.
Office Relocation NYC Guide
Are you ready to schedule a job with an office moving company? NYC commercial moves should be planned months in advance. Before you even contact movers, you must ensure everything is ready for you on the other end.
Before You Move
This means it’s crucial to review the new property lease and determine if the space meets your requirements as is or needs additional modifications.
Figure out what equipment and furniture you want to take to the new location and what you’re leaving behind. There’s no sense hauling stuff you can’t fit or won’t use in the new space. It’s not cost-effective.
Once you sort that out, determine the budget you can afford to spend on the move.
With the budget set, you have to get some commercial moving company NYC quotes. Narrowing down a list of three to five of the best commercial movers NYC has to offer is essential.
You should only trust the top-rated office movers New York provides to handle sensitive equipment, valuable goods, necessary paperwork, etc.
Find the best companies, get a bunch of quotes, compare them, and choose the best movers to handle the logistics of your commercial relocation.
Take Inventory
The more you wait to create a detailed inventory of everything you have to move, the more challenging the experience will be for you and your office movers.
Moving commercial items and entire offices has many moving parts. A detailed inventory is a great way to reduce stress and create an organized plan for a seamless relocation.
And it’s not just a matter of creating a list and keeping track of your items. Inventorying will help movers understand how to pack, store, transport, and unpack the cargo. It will also enable moving companies to give you a more accurate moving quote.
To shorten the process even further, it’s best to take inventory before a moving company representative comes to assess the situation and give you an official quote.
Make sure to label items accordingly, especially if you do some of the packings yourself. Fragile, electronics, documents, and other words can be used to categorize cargo and indicate how something should be handled.
Business Movers NYC Planning and Coordination
It’s always best to coordinate with a corporate moving company. NYC commercial moves require the best planning to ensure everything goes without a hitch. Professional movers with experience in the commercial sector can help iron out the details and logistics of your move.
For example, a moving coordinator can instruct you on how to prepare your current offices before the movers arrive. It’s essential for maximizing floor space, eliminating obstacles, and giving the movers sufficient room to maneuver with fragile, heavy, or large equipment and boxes.
Good planning will also help you set the stage at the delivery address. This is crucial, especially if you want to save time. The easier movers can take your cargo from the truck to the building, unpack, and install everything, the fast you can get your business up and running.
In addition, if the move isn’t labor intensive, you can save money. But that depends on how well you plan.
Office Moving NYC In-House Planning
It isn’t enough to coordinate with small office movers. NYC commercial moves affect more people, like your employees.
Therefore, it’s mandatory to do some in-house planning and coordinating. Once you settle on the overall plan, it’s important to bring employees into the loop. Delegate specific tasks to your staff based on their responsibilities, availability, and area of expertise.
If you have an IT team, you might want the team leader to oversee the transportation of all your IT equipment and installation.
Someone overseeing office operations could be accountable for ensuring the movers unpack the workstations and desks where they’re supposed to. Everyone should have a clear role during an office relocation process.
Besides, you’ll need help from your employees with preparing or packing everything for the big move.
Schedule the Move
Another important step in an NYC office relocation process is scheduling the move. This can be tricky because of how the transport industry works.
First, the quote may look completely different depending on when you want to move. It’s tempting to plan a move during the holidays because business operations might be slow anyway, or you could be closed.
But that’s the peak activity season for most moving companies, commercial and residential. Thus, it can be hard to find available companies, and you’ll certainly pay a premium for the service.
You should also consider seasonal challenges that might be involved in a commercial move. For example, transporting temperature-sensitive equipment in extreme temperatures isn’t ideal.
If the unloading can’t be performed close to the building entry, your cargo could be hauled manually over long walking distances. This can raise safety concerns, increase labor costs, and even require specialized equipment. But the process can be complicated even more if you add some bad weather like rain or snow on top.
Main Reasons to Avoid Commercial Moving NYC DIY Projects
If there’s one aspect of a commercial move that stands out the most, it’s insurance. Your equipment might be insured and even have years of warranty left. However, most office insurance covers damages sustained in the office, break-ins, power outages, normal wear, etc.
Just because you ensured your workstations doesn’t mean they’re also insured against damage sustained during transportation. And transporting sensitive electronic equipment, heavy desks, and other office items is no joke.
The more high-volume the cargo is, the higher the chances for something to go wrong.
Accidents are likely to happen without the proper packing equipment, transport vehicle, loading and unloading process, and labor. Unfortunately, the repair costs might have to come out of your own pocket.
Working with commercial movers is ideal because they’re insured to transport cargo. Should something get damaged in transit or during loading and unloading procedures, the insurance and liability coverage will take care of it.
Therefore, while you might be paying a couple of extra thousands of dollars to complete a commercial move using experts, you’re simultaneously protecting your finances. DIY commercial moves are risky.
In addition, working with movers means you don’t have to worry about overtime costs, uncovered work injuries, and other similar issues.
Equipment and general cargo safety is another reason to work with commercial movers. NYC traffic and the general lack of accessibility increase the risk of accidents when transporting goods.
Sure, you could always make a claim if you’re insured for transporting your own equipment. But just because something is covered doesn’t mean the compromise is worth it. Resolving an insurance claim takes a lot of time. No insurance company is eager to reimburse you.
And while you’re waiting for money to repair or buy new equipment, the workflow and business operations suffer. If your company isn’t firing on all cylinders, you stand to lose money.
Commercial moving companies are prepared to offer the best protection for your office workstations, electronics, documents, furniture, and everything else you might need to relocate.
This includes proper packaging, reliable strapping mechanisms, pulley systems for handling heavy items, good wrapping materials, etc. Even better, your cargo will be handled by people who do this for a living. They know how to lift items, store them in a truck, secure them for maximum stability, and handle everything with care.
Furthermore, not all moving vans and trucks are created equal. While you can rent your own truck to relocate the office, it doesn’t mean you’re getting the best truck for the job. Movers fine-tune and even customize their vehicles to reduce vibrations, maintain optimum temperature levels, and provide the best conditions for your cargo.
Pro Tip – Don’t Forget to Deduct the Expenses
There are many benefits to letting office relocation NYC specialists take care of a commercial move and all the logistics involved. Still, some business owners don’t want to do it because they’re afraid of the costs.
But there are two things to keep in mind. First, the quote is always based on numerous factors, and there’s a lot you can do to lower the relocation cost. For example, you can pay as little as $5,000 to move everything inside a 10,000-square-foot space into a new building. It depends on the complexity of the job.
Secondly, commercial moving NYC costs are deductible expenses. This can be an important deduction if you’re looking to work some magic with your company’s financials.
Do What’s Best for Your Business
There are many ways to reduce business expenses and be more profitable. But if you have a commercial move planned in the near future, this is not a task you want to risk with a DIY approach. Hiring professional office movers is safer and perhaps cheaper because of the risks involved with moving office equipment, furniture, documents, appliances, and workstations.
Business profitability is high when the workflow doesn’t suffer, and you have minimal downtime. Changing office buildings quickly and efficiently is the only way to ensure your business, employees, and customers don’t suffer.
