Meeting, breakout and café tables
Tables get chosen by shape and regretted by size. Work Furniture Direct supplies meeting and boardroom tables through to bistro and café tables, and the most useful thing we can tell you is to measure the room twice and the clearance around the table three times.
Sizing a meeting table
Allow 600mm of table edge per person as an absolute minimum, and 700mm if people will have laptops and papers. Then allow a metre of clear space behind every chair so people can get out without everyone else standing up.
A table that seats ten on paper usually seats eight comfortably. If the room is tight, a smaller table with room to move beats a larger one nobody can get around.
Tables that move
Folding and flip-top tables are the right answer for any room that changes use, particularly training rooms and spaces that double as event space. Check how they store: a flip-top that nests takes a fraction of the wall space of one that does not.
Breakout and shaped tables suit informal areas where the table is there to lean on rather than work at.
Power in the table
If a meeting room table will be used for anything longer than half an hour, get power into it. Retro-fitting a power module later means drilling a table you have already paid for, and the finish never quite recovers. Our cable management and electrical range covers the modules.
Café and breakout areas
Bistro and café tables and coffee and occasional tables do a different job: they make a space feel like somewhere people want to sit. Pair them with café and bistro seating or sofas and armchairs depending on how long you want people to stay.
Ranges we stock
Impulse covers the practical end, including folding and flip-top tables for rooms that change use. Brixworth runs through the coffee and occasional side, and Evolve extends the desking family into meeting and boardroom tables so a room can match its desks.
For canteens and breakout corners, see bistro and café tables paired with café seating.