Repair Café coming in April
From early on we knew we wanted Community Toolbox Canberra to host a repair café and we are looking to start in April.
What is a Repair Café?
First things first, though, what is a repair café? If you are not familiar with the concept, let us explain. Repair cafés are a place to bring your broken and not-working items to be fixed by volunteer repairers with the aim of keeping more things out of landfill, reducing consumption and lowering the pressure on the Earth’s resources. It also saves you money. Repairers offer their skills for free so you only need to pay for any significant parts that might be required.
There are several repair cafés operating in Canberra (see below) but none in the very north and, we believe, there is always room for more.
How can you help?
As we said, the repair café relies on volunteers and we are looking for two kinds. We need general helpers and, of course, repairers.
General helpers
Repair Café Helpers assist with the running of the Repair Café. They are not repairers.
Tasks might include:
setting up and packing up
welcoming customers
managing 'turn taking'
conducting exit surveys
answering enquiries
Repairers
Repair Café Repairers fix items brought in by customers, give advice on repairs and may teach people how to complete repairs themselves where appropriate. Appropriate licenses must be held for repairing electrical items. Repairers are needed for:
textiles and garments
electrical items
tech such as mobile phones
bicycles
outdoor tools such as lawnmowers
knife sharpening
jewellery repairs
toys
If you have other repair skills not listed, please do let us know. We’d love to be able to offer a wide variety.
Want to Volunteer?
Although the repair café will be open monthly on the last Saturday of the month between 1pm and 5pm, you do not have to make a monthly commitment. Whatever help you can offer would be appreciated and you will be able to register to volunteer at a session via our volunteer software.
Ready to register? Head to our Repair Café volunteer form*
* If you already have a volunteer account with us, you can update your preferences by logging in and going to the MY PROFILE tab on the top right. Select Interests and choose your preferences. Then, if you are a repairer, go to Additional Info and list your skills and interests in the Repair Skills box.