Location, Location, Location, Location, Location
by Scott Bullock
Cubico - 2.5/5
An off-brand WeWork in Manhattan. Featured all the amenities of a particularly cramped, yuppie-infested, glass-walled sardine can. At one point the ‘headquarters’ of our company was an 8 by 4 box mostly used for storage of meter-boards and free pens. Considering we needed a slight bit more room than that, we decided to invade become squatters make full use of the shared rooftop lounge. Bonus points for putting up with us as long as they did and all the free coffee we could guzzle. Downsides included having to share a space with people who were not amused by the travails of automated 50 dollar selfie drones having conniptions when let loose in a glass hallway.
It served us decently for the time, but we quickly realized we needed a real office.
35 Meadow - 4/5
An ex-tattoo parlor once either owned or simply named in honor of (it was never really clear) a porn star was, as it turns out, the perfect new home for Future Proof. The whole inside was painted purple, it had a chintzy chandelier, and the tattoo stalls made for great office dividers. Most importantly, it had a giant skull painted on the outside wall, thus earning the moniker Skull Island for a time.
It was home for a long time, but even with far more available space than the TinyBox+ we had just escaped, it was still difficult to cram an entire production company into what was effectively a single room with desks, a couch, and the most hilariously cramped shop space you have every seen. This was also when we really started acquiring a sizeable inventory, and with space already at a premium, we realized we needed to open some more branches.
HQ2 - 3/5
The HQ2 Era was something of a mixed bag. Future Proof became larger and more distributed, now occupying Skull Island, 4 storage units scattered throughout Brooklyn Uhauls, and a new rented office space shared with another company lovingly named after Bezos’ threatened Amazon expansion. While it was nice for say, the writers being able to have a meeting about their goofy robot shit without eating sawdust from show production or for us to madly hold on to every prop we ever touched, it did have the side effect of turning every endeavor into a logistical nightmare of keycards and box trucks and return times.
Bonus points for its name being an effective time capsule. Demerits because hell is a Uhaul in Greenpoint that closes in a half hour and whose loading bay is inexplicably blocked.
90 Waterbury - Pickles
Not an official office, but more of an expansion upon the HQ2 Saga. While looking around for a venue for an event, we found one right down the street. Through a series of ups, downs, chills thrills and spills, we ended up invading dumping our stuff renting it for an extended period. We did a show there, and when that was done we kept a bunch of inventory there, and we even shot a whole-ass REDACTED BY ORDER OF THE ANTI-SPOILER BRIGADE there. It was a great space.
There was only one problem: it’s right next to a pickle factory and every day in there you have to swim through the overpowering scent of pickles.
It does not matter if you like pickles. It does not matter how much anti-pickle technology you employ. It does not matter if you are stuffed up. It does not matter if you smoke. You could not escape the pickle. Your only option, if you wanted to remain sane, was embrace the pickle. Become one with the pickle. Lean into the pickle as an aesthetic choice.
Suffice it to say, we have a thing about pickles now.
333 Stagg - 10/5
We have our own warehouse with a rad second floor and Super Cool Patio and a real shop downstairs and all of our inventory in one place and total control over our venue and we’re doin a show wheeeeee!