People have asked how and why we decided to start a Repair Cafe here in Urbana. There were a lot of factors beneath the surface ranging from the affordability crisis, the amount of waste produced by having a culture of buying disposable products, helping people build skills that will help them, their families and loved ones, and so on.
The moment that we decided that we were going to do something about these problems came out of a discussion from the community solidarity group at the IMC. We were meeting about another topic, but someone suggested that if the local government isn’t going to solve the problem, can we just band together as a community and do this ourselves? That was the spark that eventually caused the Repair Cafe project to come to life. Don’t wait for someone else to solve problems for you, take direct action to make a difference today.
This origin story explains a number of things. It’s why we use volunteer time to get the word out to the community, help fix things, instead of spending hours of time trying to do fundraisers or going after grants. Our priority is to serve our community in a sustainable way. While we’re not going to turn down a grant if an opportunity lands in our lap, we don’t want to become dependent on grant money for the project to survive.
The other question that comes up from time to time is what are our goals? This is a little tricky to answer because each person who shows up at our events has their own motivations for doing so, but there are some common themes:
- Environmental
- Keeping things out of landfills
- Fewer new things being produced means less emissions from the manufacturing sector
- Financial
- Saving people money. Making a $5-10 donation for a fixed object is almost always much less expensive than buying a new one. And the donation is entirely voluntary.
- Building repair skills can be a path to building one’s own business. Come and learn, and then maybe have a side hustle as a repair person, and maybe that turns into a full time job. Some people would prefer to just pay someone to fix their stuff instead of investing the time to do it themselves. And that’s absolutely fine, we want them to get their things repaired too, even though the repair cafe isn’t a good fit
- Freedom
- Companies love to lock their customers into their ecosystems. One of the schemes they use is having “authorized repair centers” where they decide who is authorized and make extra money this way. It also means repairs are more expensive. The Repair Cafe is an unauthorized repair center. We’re not asking the manufacturer’s permission to help people repair the products that they own!
- We want people to be able to be self-sufficient. We don’t want people to depend on the Repair Cafe or any repair business to fix their stuff. We want people to be able to fix their own things. Again, it’s fine to choose to have someone repair things for you, but the important thing is that you have a choice.
We are not delusional about the impact we have. We know that mending some clothes, fixing up a stand mixer, or repairing a computer isn’t going to stop climate change, make people financially independent, or stop manufacturers from trying to restrict people’s choices. But it does help move things in the direction we want to see. The more people that participate in projects that make our community a better place, the more impact we can have.
If you are reading this and like what you hear. There are a number of ways you can support the Repair Cafe:
- Tell people about the what we’re doing here. This is listed first for a reason. Without having a large pool of people to pull from, the burden on each volunteers is greater, people will burnout, and the project will not be sustainable.
- This is also one of the areas where we struggle. We’ve already told everyone we know, and now it’s a matter of informing people we don’t know. As far as I know, none of us have a background in marketing or public relations, but if you have skills in these areas, we’d love to have your help. You can just go promote us on your own, or join the mailing list if you want to have a coordinated effort.
- Come get things fixed. If nobody shows up to get things fixed, what are we even doing here?
- Just show up at our events. No registration. No coordination needed.
- Volunteer to be a mentor. If you don’t already have the skills, bring in broken things, or come shadow a mentor to gain them.
- Just show up at our events and say you’re here to mentor. No registration. No coordination needed.
- Donate materials, tools, or money. We generally prefer things in that order. Materials are always in short supply (there is a most wanted list on the event page). We’re pretty good on tools, but they wear out and there are some that we don’t currently have (see event page for details). As for the money, even if we were to supply all our own materials and tools, we use use the Makerspace’s space (tables, chairs, electricity, internet and so forth). All these things cost money and it’s only fair that we help chip in to cover those costs.
- Drop off your donation during any of the Makerspace’s open hours
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