All, The week previous wasn’t as busy as I anticipated. I keep thinking I’ve got a handle on when the shop will be busy and I keep being surprised by the reality: quiet and calm when it’s nice/sunny and then hustle/bustle when it’s cold and windy. Go figure.
Working backwards:
All, Apologies for the delay. I was out of town Monday and Tuesday.
All, Last week we had the pleasure of welcoming Good Morning Illini to the Bike Center. I shot a segment with one of their people on patching a tube. Unfortunately, it didn’t make the air. It was still good outreach and nice to bring a few new people into the shop.
All, The doors were opened! I repeat: The doors were opened! It was finally warm enough. Turns out our coat rack is slightly too tall for the garage to be opened. We figured that out the hard way. Still very nice to get some fresh air in here.
All, Last week we were closed for Spring Break. I worked Monday and Tuesday and made some good solitary progress on shop builds. All of the Reid MTN Sport bikes that Corey finagled for us are in saleable condition and all of the For Sale bikes are nicely displayed, ready to be purchased.
All, Tail end of last week really picked up, coinciding with the weather, I guess. The first couple weeks of helping people with their bikes is always a welcome change from just wrenching on bikes for sale. Feels more on mission or something.
All, As the numbers will show: we had a very slow week. Not a lot of visitors in but the weather was pretty gnarly, too. Snow never helps.
All told, we have 40 bikes as in-progress shop builds or for sale, organized about as well as they can be in the back of the shop. Had my staff work on that last week.
All, Last week I counted 20 bikes for sale and 19 only in need of safety checks. That should put our number in the 40+ range by the time it gets warm. Maybe higher if the weather stays in the single digits like this.
All, Last week was a little out of the ordinary: we hosted Agora Days classes at to the Bike Center in collaboration with University High School. 5 students came every morning Tuesday – Friday from 11 – 12:30pm. I taught basic bicycle repairs and provided some hands-on practice with them. Overall they seemed to enjoy themselves. A big thanks to Phillip for organizing the event!
All, This past week I interviewed another student worker and had a training with a couple others. Built bikes, test rode bikes, organized bikes, too.
All, As one student staffer pointed out, we got a taste of summer last week. We had a few swells of genuine busyness. Odd for this time of year—but very welcome!
Simon taught 15 sessions with around 100 attendants total, over the 15 weeks. The sessions were Mondays from at 6:30. The sessions began on 9/5/2017 and concluded at the end of the fall semester.
All, This past week was an uneventful one. We closed on Wednesday due to the cold and the rest of the week wasn’t much better. Had a meeting with Morgan and Sarthak on Monday about Sustainability with regards to CBC.
All, Last week picked up a little. Sold a refurb bike—first of the year! Sold a B-a-B as well.
I interviewed two potential staffers last week as well. They’ve both been volunteering for 10+ hours at the Bike Center and pretty excited about what we do and working here.
All ,This past week was a very slow one. Averaged only a visitor or two per day. New hires Kelly and Jacob started and I spent the majority of the week training them. They both show good promise in their ability to understand and apply the techniques and principles of bicycle repair.
All, Last week was slow but we had a few visitors in each day. Hank and Chris helped out all week, which was good. We got a few more shop builds finished but not safety checked. The total build number is creeping towards 30.
All, Abbreviated work week for me and zero open hours last week. It was a good time to do some deep winter/early spring cleaning. I pulled about half the bikes out of the back of the shop and cleaned up and threw junk away, reorganized and decluttered the 2x4 storage shelves.
All, Welcome back from break! Hope everyone had a good time with friends and family.
The last week before break was pretty slow, as to be expected. Kevin finally finished his B-a-B, which was great. He was jazzed about it, too.
All, Last week was slow, per usual this time of year. I had a training session for two new staffers. They’ll start in the new year as they have finals this week.
Bike count is hovering around 15-20 with a few safety checks still in the queue. A couple staffers expressed interest in morning shifts this week so if that happens, hopefully it’ll result in a few more builds being ready before winter break.
This week I will continue work on the Student Staff Manual and will line up some new volunteer tasks since the regular items are getting ticked off the list.
All, Visitor numbers are down, sales are down, builds are ever-creeping up: It must be winter!
