Hi Sue – Funny story, we’re getting ready to put on our second Repair Cafe Nov. 1. Your presentation is pretty spot-on when it comes to thinking through the process. Our partners purchased the toolkit from the Repair Cafe founders, and it offered great guidance. However, there is the wild card of not knowing what skilled repair volunteers you’re going to get and/or if they will match up with what people bring in. As it happened, we could have used another small appliance person, and had a few too many sewing repair volunteers. We also had to get a waiver created, in case something got ruined during the fixing process. We also provided food for our repairers, so they could take breaks and get a snack.
Thanks Heather. What’s the duration of each repair event? Do volunteers bring their own items so they aren’t sitting with nothing to do. Also when you had more broken appliances than volunteers to help with them, were people frustrated or did they understand the nature of the beast? The library in Evanston, Il. whose webinar I watched mentioned having registration for events, but also walk-ins. This really is the definition of being okay with chaos, huh?
What a great idea! It is very well-thought-out and the concept is something that is highly needed. There is a community partner in our area who does something similar. They meet in a community meeting room and there are volunteers who will teach you how to repair things. Each month there is a different focus, so one month it is clothing repair and learning how to sew on buttons and the like. The next month, it is mechanical, and someone teaches how to diagnois problems with the small appliances. I think this would be popular program!
That;s an interesting approach and may help with the wild card aspect that Heather was talking about. I’d really like to see if we can do it at our library. I have a dead air fryer/toaster oven I like to get working again. 🙂
4 Comments
Heather B
Hi Sue – Funny story, we’re getting ready to put on our second Repair Cafe Nov. 1. Your presentation is pretty spot-on when it comes to thinking through the process. Our partners purchased the toolkit from the Repair Cafe founders, and it offered great guidance. However, there is the wild card of not knowing what skilled repair volunteers you’re going to get and/or if they will match up with what people bring in. As it happened, we could have used another small appliance person, and had a few too many sewing repair volunteers. We also had to get a waiver created, in case something got ruined during the fixing process. We also provided food for our repairers, so they could take breaks and get a snack.
Sue Donnim
Thanks Heather. What’s the duration of each repair event? Do volunteers bring their own items so they aren’t sitting with nothing to do. Also when you had more broken appliances than volunteers to help with them, were people frustrated or did they understand the nature of the beast? The library in Evanston, Il. whose webinar I watched mentioned having registration for events, but also walk-ins. This really is the definition of being okay with chaos, huh?
missjennthelibrarian
Hi, Sue,
What a great idea! It is very well-thought-out and the concept is something that is highly needed. There is a community partner in our area who does something similar. They meet in a community meeting room and there are volunteers who will teach you how to repair things. Each month there is a different focus, so one month it is clothing repair and learning how to sew on buttons and the like. The next month, it is mechanical, and someone teaches how to diagnois problems with the small appliances. I think this would be popular program!
Sue Donnim
That;s an interesting approach and may help with the wild card aspect that Heather was talking about. I’d really like to see if we can do it at our library. I have a dead air fryer/toaster oven I like to get working again. 🙂