Built by someone who actually works in commercial furniture.

Who's behind this site

My name is Austin Frantell. I'm the Sales Manager at National Office Interiors & Liquidators, a commercial furniture dealership that handles everything from new furniture procurement to liquidations, installations, moves, refurbishment, and storage — nationwide.

My day job puts me in the middle of real projects every day: helping companies furnish new offices, coordinating multi-phase installations, managing large-scale liquidations, and advising buyers on product selection across every major manufacturer — Steelcase, Herman Miller, Haworth, Knoll, Kimball, HON, Humanscale, and more.

I built The Modern Workspace because the information buyers find online is overwhelmingly generic, promotional, or written by people who have never specified a task chair or walked a floor plan. Buyers deserve better — honest guidance from someone who does this work, not someone who writes about it from a distance.

What I've worked on

The range of projects I work on gives me a perspective that most content sites can't offer:

• New furniture procurement — from 10-person startups to 500+ seat corporate buildouts, specifying product across value, mid-range, and premium tiers
• Liquidations — helping companies recover value from surplus inventory through dealer buyback, brokered sales, and donation programs
• Installations — coordinating delivery, assembly, and punch list resolution with installation crews, building management, and IT teams
• Office moves — managing furniture disassembly, transport, and reassembly across local and long-distance relocations
• Refurbishment & reupholstery — advising when it makes financial sense to restore versus replace, and managing the process
• Space planning — working with dealer design teams and architects on test fits, product layouts, and finish selections using CET Designer and AutoCAD

This hands-on experience is what makes the content on this site different. When I write about lead times, I'm writing from projects where lead times mattered. When I quote pricing ranges, they come from real orders — not manufacturer list prices.

What this site covers

The Modern Workspace covers the full commercial furniture lifecycle — sector-specific buying guides (corporate, healthcare, education, government, hospitality), project service guides (installations, moves, liquidations, decommissions, storage, reupholstery, refurbishment), workspace planning fundamentals (space planning, acoustics, lighting, flooring, architectural walls), and 20 interactive tools and calculators.

The content covers new furniture, pre-owned and refurbished furniture, and the mix strategies that experienced buyers use to get the best outcome from both. No option is treated as a fallback — used and refurbished furniture is a legitimate, smart strategy when it fits the project.

How the site makes money

Transparency matters. The Modern Workspace generates revenue through display advertising (Google AdSense), project lead referrals, and eventually premium subscriptions and marketplace listing fees. Every affiliate relationship is disclosed on the relevant page and in the affiliate disclosure.

None of those revenue streams influence what gets covered or how it's covered. If replacing is smarter than refurbishing, I'll say so. If a budget brand is the right fit, I won't push premium. The content reflects industry reality, not whoever is paying for placement.