Kastle Systems’ Nationwide Back to Work Barometer Tracks Pace of Return to Office Buildings Post-COVID

Aggregated occupancy data indicates when and where Americans are returning to offices

Washington, D.C. — As states and cities begin phased re-openings, American companies and employees are starting to return to the office. Kastle Systems, the country’s largest managed security services provider to commercial businesses, has released anonymized aggregated building access data from Kastle-secured properties in 10 major cities to better understand office occupancy patterns following COVID-19.

The data tell the story of the nation quickly sheltering in place in March and April and now slowly venturing back to the workplace. The earliest notable decline in occupancy was in the first week of March in San Francisco. Other cities saw similar patterns. By the first week in April, Washington, D.C. buildings, for example, were only 14% full – well below the baseline of 96% in March.

Occupancy rates started to tick up in Austin, Houston, Los Angeles and Miami in late May and cities like  Chicago and Philadelphia have picked up more recently. The Kastle Back to Work Barometer indicates that Western and Southwestern cities like Dallas, Houston and Los Angeles, are leading the nation in terms of returning to the office.

“The question on everyone’s minds right now is when will it be okay to go back to the office,” Kastle CEO Haniel Lynn said. “We’re keeping a close eye on trends in occupancy data as part of our KastleSafeSpaces framework, which is designed to help office buildings safely reopen. As the uptick in occupancy continues, Kastle stands ready to help the safe transition happen.”

Kastle has combined decades of security experience with best practices around managing the novel coronavirus to introduce KastleSafeSpaces, which lets workplaces re-open by making their spaces smarter and safer, while maintaining a level of convenience that’s enabled by technology.

Kastle will be releasing updates to the data weekly on its website and LinkedIn. The Kastle Back to Work Barometer reflects daily swipes of Kastle access controls from 10 major cities out of 138 cities with Kastle properties. It summarizes recent building access activity among our business partners, not a national statistical sample. Federal holidays and weekends are not included in the data.

About Kastle Systems

Kastle Systems has been leading the security industry since 1972 with advanced managed security solutions and services, protecting commercial real estate, multi-family residential, global enterprises, educational institutions, and critical government facilities. Kastle’s state-of-the-art security solutions include access control, video surveillance, visitor management and identity management, as well as a suite of mobile security applications, all integrated on an open, standards-based platform and supported by a team of experts 24x7x365. Headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, Kastle is on CIOReview’s 2019 List of Top 10 Physical Security Providers.

For more information about KastleSafeSpaces, KastleAccess or any of the other advanced security innovations from Kastle Systems, contact Jake Heinz, Chief Marketing Officer at [email protected].