Built by someone who actually works in commercial furniture.
Not a content agency. Not a marketing team. A sales manager who has walked job sites, coordinated installations, quoted liquidations, and managed projects from first call to final punch list.
Who's behind this site
My name is Austin Frantell. I'm the Phoenix Sales Manager at National Office Interiors & Liquidators, where I lead strategic growth and partnerships for 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, from refurbished Steelcase, MillerKnoll, and Haworth to new lines like goSIT, HON, SitOnIt, Kimball, and Humanscale.
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 share pricing ranges, I'm clear about where they come from, whether that's real project pricing or manufacturer list.
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.
Questions about a project, content feedback, corrections, or industry partnerships? Reach out directly.
Contact form →LinkedIn →Real projects, real results.
Furnished three floors for an autonomous vehicle company in California against a tight deadline: 400+ task chairs, height-adjustable desks, and beam power systems, with follow-on orders of spec seating and 18-foot collaboration tables as they continue to expand.
Delivered a Tucson call center buildout in two phases: new cubicles specified, installed, and punch-listed around the client's move-in date, including a mid-project finish reselection that protected the schedule when the original laminate hit a supply delay.
Furnished multiple offices for a national accounting firm as they expanded and relocated across markets, with value-driven pricing that kept each project inside budget and earned the next round of work.