Then take a moment to decide if our volunteer program will work for you and your schedule. **
Something all volunteers should know!
No mechanics experience is needed to be a volunteer with us. This is intentional because we want to make bike mechanics more accessible to everyone... AND... Learning bike mechanics takes many, many hours to be good at! Our goal is to train everyone in bike mechanics skills and, while we hope you will practice and gain some comfort with those skills, it is important to keep in mind that mastering these skills, especially on old and used bikes in our shop, takes both time and patience.
Bikes Together Volunteer Roles (Who are we looking for?)
- As a small nonprofit bike shop, Bikes Together utilizes volunteers to support our shop operations and programming. Volunteers' main role is to help remove, evaluate, sort, and organize used parts for sale in our cost-flexible shop (We call this shift "Shop Love"). These tasks are typically self-led and require new volunteers to utilize shop resources, problem solve and ask questions of other volunteers and staff. Re-organizing, cleaning, and answering customer questions (or deferring customers to staff) are also everyday duties in our shop.
- Once volunteers feel comfortable in the shop, they can support our public programs Learn & Repair, Mobile Repair Clinics, and our Gender Equality Mechanics (GEM) Night. These require some mechanics knowledge, but also require communication, customer service skills, and a willingness to outreach with participants. We ask that volunteers self select for the shifts that suit their interests and check in with Molly if your schedule does not align with the shift you'd like so that we can come up with a solution together.
- While we do give away some bikes to community members and partners, Bikes Together's main focus is on empowering participants to learn about and fix their own bikes. We rarely host bike giveaway events or Rodeos as is common in other bike co-ops. Our volunteers are only occasionally refurbishing/fixing up bikes and never in bulk. Please consider other bike nonprofits if this is the kind of volunteer work you're interested in (Hope Cycle, Lucky Bikes, Second Chance are some options).
- Mechanics is only one part of what we offer to our volunteers- we also hope that you will gain valuable interpersonal skills, feel more confident learning something new, and feel a sense of belonging in our little bike community! Bikes Together hopes folks who are looking for friendships, new hobbies, or to feel empowered on their bikes will also consider volunteering!
Still excited to volunteer? Continue on to learn about our volunteer shifts and our onboarding process.
