TAMPA, Fla. — The five-day workweek has long been the standard for American workers. But some companies are experimenting with a different approach.
Tampa Bay-based Brick Media first began a four-day workweek for its employees on a trial basis. Three years later, the company has kept to the schedule while continuing to grow.
Meanwhile, developing content comes as second nature for the creative team at Brick Media. But the way this social media agency structures its work week is anything but traditional.
“I was trying to think about work-life balance for myself and I just thought maybe, well, what if we didn’t work on Fridays?” said Brick Media CEO and Founder Jake Kurtz.
Three years ago, Kurtz had the idea of moving his staff to a four-day work week.
“When the new year started, I told the team we’re going to do this as a pilot test for 90 days and see how it goes,” he said. “I didn’t want to jump all in because I didn’t know how it was going to work with our clients and even if it would be good for the company.”
The experiment became permanent
Brick Media’s employees work four 10-hour days each week.
The switch, Kurtz says, is paying off. Both for the company and its employees. And, he said, the compressed schedule hasn’t slowed the company’s growth.
“We’ve had like 25% growth, 30% growth, 20% growth just consistently year over year,” he said, citing company-reported numbers. “So since 2023, we’ve definitely doubled in revenue, which is incredible. Our employee count has probably also doubled in that time frame, too. So we just continue to grow every year.”
The idea of working four-days a week attracted employees like Olivia Rhoades, who said that fitting the work into fewer days requires staff to be more deliberate about how they use those hours.
“I knew I’d have more flexibility, which is what everybody’s looking for. These days, we want more time with family and friends,” she said. “I feel like things actually get accomplished a lot faster here. With my five-day work week, I feel like everything almost got drawn out. We’re very harsh here, in a good way! On not having our meetings go too much over 30 minutes. We’re really good at that. We really manage our time here, and that helps the four-day work week thrive.”
Executives say the company has also seen an impact on employee retention.
“We’re on for longer periods of time during the day, but when we’re on, we’re completely focused,” said Andrea Echeverry, Director of Client Experience. “In that sense, it’s benefited our culture, and I think it’s benefited just the way we all work together on a day-to-day basis.”
And while Kurtz says the schedule has become part of the company’s identity, he said working four days was never the ultimate objective.
“The four-day work week itself isn’t the goal,” he said. “The goal is to build a great company where people stay for a long time. We still do great work, but we still have a life while we do it.”