A Social Network for the Unemployed

From the Wall Street Journal | Aug 28, 2009 By Marisa Taylor

During
the last U.S. recession in 2001, the newly unemployed often gathered to
trade horror stories and job-seeking tips at groups like the Five O'Clock Club. During this recession, of course, the newly unemployed swap stories online, particularly on social networks.

405 Club

But, for at least one social network for the jobless - the The 405 Club,
named in honor of the $405 a week maximum given out in New York
unemployment checks -online is not enough. They still like to meet in
person, occasionally.

So on a warm Wednesday afternoon this week, the members of The 405
Club gathered at Sheep's Meadow in Central Park. The picnic was
nominally in honor of club reaching a new milestone of signing up its
405th member, but it was mostly a chance to snack and socialize.

"What I've found to be the greatest value is the community," said
28-year-old Courtney Adams. "It's an easy way to be part of a great
group of people who are also unemployed, but you don't feel the shame
or the isolation of it. I mean, a lot of us are stuck at home half the
time."

The 405 Club launched in January when founders Garrett Dale, Jose
Gonzalez, and Ethan Paul found themselves laid off and looking for
camaraderie. Mr. Gonzalez, 32, is a graduate of the University of
Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business and worked for a fund of
hedge funds until he was laid off last December. He played on the same
recreational soccer team as Mr. Dale, 27, a graduate of Tufts
University who was a manager of radio promotions at Sony's Epic Records
until his entire group was downsized.

Mr. Gonzalez says they wanted to help others who found themselves in
the same boat. "The dangers of becoming unemployed are really apathy,
boredom, or just being depressed," he said. "I wanted to avoid that."

So the club started as an informal weekly barbecue at various
friends' homes, but after several weeks, the group was too big to fit
into a single apartment. So they started meeting up at coffee houses
and bars, and sometimes they would even score drink specials.

But the site really took off when Mr. Dale, who was trying to get a
job in digital marketing, built a Web site the 405 Club and its social network to promote the site.

The 405 Club's favorite success story is that of Ms. Adams, a friend
of Mr. Dale's who was also laid off from her marketing job at Epic
Records. She'd already studied business at the University of Virginia,
but after signing up for Mayor Bloomberg's FastTrac program for aspiring entrepreneurs, she decided to pursue her passion for cooking and founded her own catering company, Uptown Comfort.
The 405 Group helped her get her very first gig, a 500-person charity
event with the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, through a member
who was on the hospital's board.

Now, Ms. Adams is up and running with jobs to spare, and she hires
members of The 405 Club as servers for her events. As a thank you, she
provided her homemade chocolate chip cookies and cornbread cake to the
group's picnic.

"I didn't have many expectations [of the group] at the beginning,"
she said. "But what I found to be the greatest value is the community
of it. These are all highly qualified, really intelligent people who
have all come under the same circumstance."

The 405 Club is not the only social network for the unemployed. Ning, which hosts the 405 Club's social network, also hosts communities such as Who Killed the Bear, a network for former Bear Stearns employees, along with Forever Lehman, a network for downsized Lehman Brothers employees.

On a more optimistic note, The 405 Club does have an alumni network
for those members who have since been hired, including one of the
founders Mr. Paul, who took a job in Charlotte, N.C., and couldn't
attend the picnic.