A national coworking company is planning to open its first Maryland franchise location in Ellicott City.

Office Evolution is seeking a location and local franchise partner for the new Howard County space. The company’s coworking locations are typically about 7,000 to 10,000 square feet and hold up to 35 private offices.

The Louisville, Colorado-based company provides rentable office spaces for small business owners in more than 65 franchise locations across more than 20 states. CEO Mark Hemmeter said his 15-year-old company is capitalizing on the “really hot concept” of coworking, but also targeting a different working population than typical shared workspaces.

Office Evolution focuses on small markets and suburban areas, he said, away from the big cities that typically come to mind when thinking about cool new shared office spaces. He said there are a lot of small business owners, or people who run their businesses out of their homes in these areas, like consultants, lawyers and independent accountants. The company is not seeking tenants like young or growing tech startups, Hemmeter said, but rather the business owners providing outside services for those kinds of companies.

“These people are often doing everything by themselves, and we want to help them offload some things,” Hemmeter said. “And it’s not just the space. We do mail, phone answering, we even provide health insurance. We help them with that stuff, so they can really focus on building their business.”

Business owners interested in renting space at an Office Evolution pay between $79 and $1,500 per month for different offices and levels of service.

Hemmeter said his company is talking with some potential franchise owners now, and looking for office brokers to help narrow down a potential site in Ellicott City. He said Ellicott City was selected as the first location for a Maryland space based on a “heat map” that shows the places that best fit Office Evolution’s target criteria: a high population of home-based business, a growing out-of-city business ecosystem with a large target age group of business owners around 35 and older.

If the Ellicott City location shows good traction, Office Evolution may open other Maryland spaces in other “hot” areas, like Bethesda, Annapolis, Towson, Ruxton and Columbia.