Brian, you'll probably find it's like highway construction - build
more roads and more cars fill them up. ;)
I don't think you'll find it decreases anything. Like most shops,
every hour you are open will have people requesting your services.
During Spring and into the Summer it is barely-managed chaos in our
shop, but we make it through (upon moving into our new shop we've
added a second volunteer staff position to help manage things). Ever
since we allowed do-it-yourself repair on every shift we've struggled
to meet that demand, because we could have all four workstands
humming every night, but that would crowd out the volunteers. And
the volunteers are the ones that fix up the bikes that pay our rent.
The DIY only adds minimally to our bottom line, but we all feel it's
important that folks have a place to fix their own bikes. So we
carry on...
Last summer I started staffing Sundays from 3-6 (to fit my schedule
that day) and made it a volunteer-only shift - no DIY, and no sales.
The turnout was not as good as I'd hoped, but even through this
winter I've had from one to six vols. attending. But if I made it a
DIY day I'd be swamped.
Now for this coming Spring we're looking at opening on Mondays during
the day and Saturday afternoons, using paid staff (the other weekdays
have our partner org. using our shop for training purposes). The
Mondays will be like the evenings - open to all, and we'll test the
demand. But the Saturdays will most likely be just sales and
volunteers, because even with two staff the DIY demand would probably
be over the top. Maybe we'll add DIY in the Summer after the Spring
sales settle down...
Mark
On 20-Feb-09, at 1:49 PM, Urban Bike Project Wilmington, DE wrote:
UBP is currently open two days of the week, one Thursday night and
one Saturday afternoon. We are considering opening another
weeknight, as our current hours sometimes get really, really crowded.For anyone that has recently expanded their hours or can recall
when you did so in the past: Did opening more hours decrease
traffic on your other open days, or merely become another busy night?We are entering our second year of operation, still growing and
anticipate being even more crowded this year.Thanks for your insight, Brian Windle
Urban Bike Project of Wilmington -a 501(c)3 non-profit bike shop- 1908 N. Market Street (entrance is in the parking lot behind the
building) Wilmington, DE 19801Hours: Thursday 6:30-9:00 Saturday 1:00-4:00
Visit us online at http://urbanbikeproject.org